diminutive – Millie Thom

Word of the Week (WOW) is a weekly challenge created by Heena Rathore P. It’s a fun way to improve vocabulary by learning new words every week. To participate, simply do a post with your word and leave the link as a comment on Heena’s WOW post for this week (above link).

I’m looking at the letter D this week.

I’m still in the middle of my Malta posts. Back to those soon . . .

So, here is my WOW for this week:

Word:

Diminutive

Pronunciation:

di·min·u·tive [dih-min-yuh-tiv] (dɪˈmɪn yə tɪv)

Audio: diminutive

Part of Speech:

Adjective

Related Forms:

Adverb: diminutively

Noun: diminutiveness

Meaning:

adj. Extremely or extraordinarily small:
Diminutive doorway. A tiny doorway, 18 inches high, in an ancient wall on Motherby Hill. The notice on the door says: “DANGER steep staircase”. Source: geograph.org.uk. Author: Richard Croft.

2. n. Grammar: Of or being a suffix that indicates smallness or qualities such a youth, familiarity, affection – or even contempt. Egs: -let in booklet, -kin in lambkin, or -et in nymphet, or – ette, as in kitchenette.

An example of a Canadian cuisinette /kitchenette in a studio apartment in Quebec. Author: Shadiac. Commons

3. A diminutive suffix, word or name, e.g. Maggie for Margaret, Tommy /Tommie for Thomas. (My son, Thomas – fifth ‘child’ now 34 – positively refuses to answer to Tommy!)

4. n. A very small person or thing (persons in this example):

Diminutive humans attack a giant cat. A ghost-like figure sits in a boat at the top left. Wellcome Trust mages. Commons — Diminutive humans attack a giant cat. A ghost-like figure sits in a boat at the top left.
Wellcome Trust mages. Commons

Word Origin:

1350-1400; Middle English diminutif, from Old French, from Latin dīminutīvus, from dīminūtus, past participle of dīminuere.

Synonyms:

small, little, tiny, minute, pocket-sized, mini, wee, miniature, petite, midget, undersized, teeny-weeny, Lilliputian, bantam, teensy-weensy, pygmy, flyspeck

Antonyms:

big, enormous, giant, huge, immense, important, large, tall

Use in a Sentence:

We emerged from the pine forest into an open space, with a diminutive loch, little more than a pond, at the centre of it:

Diminutive Fir Loch. geograph.org.uk. Author: Des Colhoun. Commons

2. The body of the female Giant House Spider can reach 18.5 mm (0.73 in) in length, with that of the male being much more diminutive at 12.7 mm (1.5 in):

Female Giant House Spider, of the genus Tegenaria atrica, building its second egg sac. From Cologne, Germany. Author: Sarefo. Commons

3. In the silent room at one minute to midnight on Christmas Eve, the diminutive green-clad elf hopped down from the Christmas tree, ready to help Santa unload his toys when he came down the chimney: