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| Mawson, C.O.S., ed. (1870–1938). Roget’s International Thesaurus. 1922. |
| Class V. Words Releasing to the Voluntary Powers |
| Division (I) Individual Volition |
| Section II. Prospective Volition |
| 2. Degree of Subservience |
| 643. Unimportance. |
| NOUN: | UNIMPORTANCE, insignificance, nothingness, immateriality. TRIVIALITY, levity, frivolity, fribble; paltriness &c. adj.; poverty; smallness [See Smallness]; vanity (uselessness) [See Inutility]; matter of indifference [See Indifference]; no object. NOTHING, - to signify, - worth speaking of, - particular, - to boast of, - to speak of; small -, no great -, trifling &c. adj.- matter; mere joke, mere nothing; hardly -, scarcely- anything; nonentity, small beer, cipher; no great shakes [colloq.], peu de chose [F.]; child’s play. TOY, plaything, popgun, paper pellet, gimcrack, gewgaw, bauble, trinket, bagatelle, kickshaw, knickknack, whimwham, trifle, “trifles light as air” [Othello]. TRUMPERY, trash, rubbish, stuff, fatras [F.], frippery; “leather or prunello” [Pope]; fiddle-faddle [colloq.], fingle-fangle; chaff, drug, froth, bubble, smoke, cobweb; weed; refuse (inutility) [See Inutility]; scum (dirt) [See Uncleanness]. JOKE, jest, snap of the fingers, snap of one’s thumb; fudge (unmeaning) [See Unmeaningness]; fiddlestick, pack of nonsense, mere farce. TRIFLE, straw, pin, fig, fico [archaic], button, rush; bulrush, feather, halfpenny, farthing, brass farthing, doit, peppercorn, iota, tinker’s dam (or damn), continental [U. S.], jot, mote, rap, pinch of snuff, old song; cent, mill, picayune [colloq.]; pai, pice [both India]; pistareen, red cent [U. S.]. nine days’ wonder, ridiculus mus [L.]; flash in the pan (impotence) [See Impotence]; much ado about nothing (overestimation) [See Overestimation]; tempest -, storm- in a teapot. MINUTIÆ, details, minor details, small fry; dust in the balance, feather in the scale, drop in the ocean, fleabite, pin prick, molehill. |
| VERB: | BE UNIMPORTANT &c. adj.; not matter [See Importance]; go for -, matter -, signify- -little, - nothing, - little or nothing; not matter a straw &c. n. make light of (underestimate) [See Underestimation]; catch at straws (overestimate) [See Overestimation]; tumble -, stumble- over one’s shadow; make mountains out of molehills, make much ado about nothing. |
| ADJECTIVE: | UNIMPORTANT; of -little, - small, - no- -account, - importance [See Importance]; immaterial; nonessential, unessential, irrelevant, not vital, uninteresting; indifferent, amateurish. SUBORDINATE (inferior) [See Inferiority]; mediocre (average) [See Mean]; passable, fair, respectable, tolerable, commonplace; uneventful, mere, common; ordinary (habitual) [See Habit]; inconsiderable, soso or so-so, insignificant, nugatory, inappreciable. TRIFLING, trivial; slight, slender, light, flimsy, frothy, idle; puerile &c. (fool-ish) [See Imbecility; Folly]; airy, shallow; weak [See Weakness]; powerless [See Impotence]; frivolous, petty, niggling; peddling, piddling, fribbling, fribble, inane, ridiculous, farcical; finical, finicking or finicky or finikin, mincing, fiddle-faddle [colloq.], namby-pamby, wishy-washy [colloq.], milk and water, insipid. PALTRY, poor, pitiful; contemptible (contempt) [See Contempt]; sorry, mean, meager or meagre, shabby, miserable, wretched, vile, scrubby, scrannel [archaic], weedy, niggardly, scurvy, beggarly, worthless, twopenny-halfpenny, two-for-a-cent, two-by-four [colloq., U. S.], cheap, trashy, catchpenny, gimcrack, trumpery; one-horse [U. S.]. not worth -the pains, - while, - mentioning, - speaking of, - a thought, - a curse, - a cent, - a rap, - a hair, - a straw &c. n.; beneath contempt, below par; not up to -sample, - specification; beneath-, unworthy of- -notice, - regard - consideration; de lanâ caprinâ [L.]; vain (useless) [See Inutility]. |
| ADVERB: | SLIGHTLY &c. adj.; rather, somewhat, pretty well, fairly, fairly well, tolerably. FOR AUGHT ONE CARES; it matters not, it does not signify; it is of no -consequence, - importance. |
| INTERJECTION: | NO MATTER! pish! tush! tut! pshaw! pugh! pooh, -pooh! fudge! bosh! humbug! fiddlestick, - end! fiddledeedee! never mind! n’importe! [F.]; what signifies! what matter! what boots it! what of that! what’s the odds! a fig for! stuff! nonsense! stuff and nonsense! |
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