little
Pronunciation: /ˈlɪ.tl̩/
The English word “little” has 20 meanings listed here.
adjective
- Small, not large, limited, particularly
- Small, limited in size.
- Short, limited in extent.
- Brief, limited in duration.
- Young, limited in growth.
- Younger, regardless of size or height.
- Undeveloped or underdeveloped, limited in development, particularly (offensive, of a male) in the genitals.
- Small, limited in number, having few members.
- Insignificant, trivial, limited in importance.
- Weak, inferior, unimportant, etc., used to belittle a person.
- Denoting a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
- Used with the name of a place to imply that the inhabitants have an insular attitude and are hostile to those they perceive as foreign.
- Mean, selfish, bigoted, etc., limited in spirit.
- Independent, limited in scale, especially contrasted with well-organized and well-capitalized cartels controlling most of an industry, market, etc.
adverb
- Not much.
- Not at all.
determiner
pronoun
noun
- A small amount.
- A child, particularly an infant.
Etymology
From Middle English litel, litell, luitel, lutel, lutil, luytel, from Old English lȳtel, lyttel, from Proto-West Germanic *lūtil (“little”), from *lūtan (“to bow down, lout”), from Proto-Germanic *lūtaną (“to bow down, lout”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, crouch, duck”), equivalent to lout + -le. Cognates Cognate with Yola lethel, litha, lithel, lythea (“little”), North Frisian letj…
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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.