picayune.
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.
Meaning & usage
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.
A coin worth five cents (a nickel) or some other low value.
A person regarded as unworthy of respect or useless; also, something of very little value; a trifle.
An argument, fact, or other issue raised (often intentionally) that distracts from a larger issue or fails to make any difference.
Where this word comes from
The noun is borrowed from southern French picaillon, pécaillon, picayon (“type of small foreign coin; (informal, especially in the plural) cash, money”), and from its etymon Occitan picalhon, picaioun (“cheaply made Savoyan-Piedmontese coin that was rapidly demonetized; (by extension) cash, money”), probably from Occitan piquar (“to ring (bells); to knock, strike”) (referring to the clinking of coins in a pocket), originally imitative. The adjective is derived from the noun.
Of little consequence; small and of little importance; petty, trivial.
Childishly spiteful; tending to go on about unimportant things; small-minded.
Where this word comes from
The noun is borrowed from southern French picaillon, pécaillon, picayon (“type of small foreign coin; (informal, especially in the plural) cash, money”), and from its etymon Occitan picalhon, picaioun (“cheaply made Savoyan-Piedmontese coin that was rapidly demonetized; (by extension) cash, money”), probably from Occitan piquar (“to ring (bells); to knock, strike”) (referring to the clinking of coins in a pocket), originally imitative. The adjective is derived from the noun.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.