| 释义 |
picayune, n. and a. U.S.|pɪkəˈjuːn|
Also piccayune, picharoon, pickayune.
[In Louisiana, a. Pr. picaioun, mod.F. picaillon (1750 in Hatz.-Darm.), name of an old copper coin of Piedmont, now in Fr. ‘halfpence, cash, money’: of uncertain origin (Hatz.-Darm.).]
A. n. The name formerly given in Louisiana, Florida, etc., to the Spanish half-real, value 61/4 cents or 3 pence; now to the U.S. 5-cent piece or other coin of small value; hence colloq., a person or thing considered small, mean, or insignificant.
1804J. F. Watson Jrnl. 4 Nov. in Amer. Pioneer (1843) II. 228 One can't buy anything [at New Orleans] for less than a six cent piece, called a picayune. 1832R. Baird View of Valley of Mississippi xxii. 264 [In Louisiana] the words ‘piccayune’ (6 1–4 cents) and bit—(12 1–2 cents) fall upon the ear at every step. 1839J. K. Townsend Narr. Journey Rocky Mts. i. 17 We gave him a pickayune for his trouble, and went on. 1852Mrs. Stowe Uncle Tom's C. xx, From him she got many a stray picayune, which she laid out in nuts and candies. Ibid. xxxix, Our chance wouldn't be worth a picayune. 1903Scribner's Mag. XXXIII. 508 A pack of jealous picayunes, who bickered while the army starved. 1904N.Y. Even. Post 25 Jan. 6 It doesn't matter a picayune whether the justices or the members of the diplomatic corps were presented first. 1948Reader's Digest Dec. 148/1 Don't care a picayune how you waste that boy's time, do you? 1979M. G. Eberhart Bayou Road xxi. 288 His life wouldn't be worth a picayune.
B. adj. Mean, contemptible, paltry. Also absol. colloq.
1813Cramer's Pittsburgh Almanac 1814 60 The incessant hum of the blabbering (coloured) market women, seated on the ground..by the side of their picharoon (six cent) piles of vegetables. 1837Congress. Globe 25th Congress 2 Sess. App. 19 The hon. Senator from Kentucky..by way of ridicule, calls this a ‘picayune bill’. 1856H. Greeley in Greeley or Lincoln 127 The infernal picayune spirit in which it is published has broken my heart. a1859New York Herald (Bartlett), There is nothing picayune about the members of St. George's [Cricket] Club. 1892Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 8 Nov. 4/3 Do you want another picayune Congress with all its stupidity and folly? 1915New Republic 31 July 336/1 They instinctively regard the critic as puny and picayune. 1936Delineator Nov. 11/2 No picayune place like this could pay that man. 1955E. Pound Classic Anthol. ii. 104 Your picayune in-laws in fat government jobs. 1965H. Mitchell Underground War against Revolutionary France iv. 46 Overlooking the serious divisions between the pure and constitutional royalists, Grenville naïvely expected them to bury their picayune differences in a sudden glow of friendship. 1967–8Bahamas Handbk. & Businessmen's Ann. (ed. 7) 77 A picayune mongrel comes from its midday torpor. 1973Listener 20 Dec. 849/3 His projects at that point were getting picayune. He was no longer a great baseball-player. 1974[see nitpicker]. 1975Encounter Feb. 44/2 Most of the snags and pratfalls he cites seem to me picayune matters. |