Word.ws English Dictionary

picayunes

picayunes is the plural of picayune.

Meaning of picayune

Noun

picayune (plural picayunes)

  1. (Louisiana, US, especially, historical) A small coin of the value of six-and-a-quarter cents; a Spanish coin with a value of half a real; a fippenny bit.
  2. (US, archaic, broadly) A coin worth five cents (a nickel) or some other low value.
  3. (US, figuratively, informal) A person regarded as unworthy of respect or useless; also, something of very little value; a trifle.
  4. (US, figuratively, informal) An argument, fact, or other issue raised (often intentionally) that distracts from a larger issue or fails to make any difference.

See all 6 meanings of picayune

Questions about picayunes

What is picayunes the plural of?
Picayunes is the plural of picayune.

Words near picayunes in the dictionary

  1. Picatinny rail
  2. Picatinny rails
  3. picayune
  4. picayunely
  5. picayuneness
  6. picayunes
  7. picayunish
  8. picayunishness
  9. Picazo
  10. Picazos
  11. PICC

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: picayunes (page history and authors); picayune (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: “picayunes.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/picayunes. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.