Word.ws English Dictionary

pettifogs

pettifogs is the third-person singular simple present indicative of pettifog.

Meaning of pettifog

Verb

pettifog (third-person singular simple present pettifogs, present participle pettifogging, simple past and past participle pettifogged)

  1. (intransitive) To quibble over trivial matters; nitpick.
    • Don't pettifog or we will soon grow weary.
  2. (intransitive) To do a petty business as a lawyer, or carry out law business in a petty or tricky way.
    • He is a common barreter for his pleasure, that takes no money, but pettifogs gratis.c. 1840, “Samuel Butler”, in Lives of Eminent and Illustrious Englishmen

Questions about pettifogs

What is pettifogs the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Pettifogs is the third-person singular simple present indicative of pettifog.

Words near pettifogs in the dictionary

  1. pettifoggers
  2. pettifoggery
  3. pettifogging
  4. pettifoggings
  5. pettifoging
  6. pettifogs
  7. pettifogulize
  8. pettifogulized
  9. pettifogulizes
  10. pettifogulizing
  11. Pettiford

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pettifogs (page history and authors); pettifog (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “pettifogs.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pettifogs. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.