maiosis

Noun

meiosis (countable and uncountable, plural meioses)

1. (rhetoric) A figure of speech in which something is presented as smaller or less significant than it actually appears.
   • I knew, with one of those secret knowledges that can exist between two people, that her suicide was a direct result of my having told her of my own attempt – I had told it with a curt meiosis that was meant to conceal depths; and she had called my bluff one final time.1965, John Fowles, The Magus

   Synonyms:

   understatement

   Antonyms:

   hyperbole, overstatement, exaggeration, auxesis

2. (uncountable, usually) Cell division of a diploid cell into four haploid cells, which develop to produce gametes.

   Synonyms:

   reduction division