pygmeann.adj.

a1540 (c1460) G. Hay tr. Bk. King Alexander 14449 [Th]e land of Pigmeanis [L. Pygmaeos] The quhilkis had euer were agane the crannys.

1555 R. Eden tr. Peter Martyr of Angleria Decades of Newe Worlde ii. x. f. 85^v I nowe compare a Pigmean or a dwarfe [L. pygmaeolum] to a giant.

1559 W. Cuningham Cosmogr. Glasse 191 Ther are also Pygmeans (men but a cubite in height) which riding on Goates and Rammes, do kepe warre with Cranes.

1601 P. Holland tr. Pliny Hist. World I. vii. ii. 156 Aristotle writeth, That these Pygmæans liue in hollow caues & holes under the ground.

1645 J. Gower Pyrgomachia sig. A2 With an slight Pygmæan Elfe, or such poore base dejected pelfe Shee scornes below to creepe.

1667 J. Milton Paradise Lost i. 780 Now less then smallest Dwarfs, in narrow room Throng numberless, like that Pigmean Race Beyond the Indian Mount. View more context for this quotation

1676 T. Hobbes tr. Homer Iliads iii. 37 Or like the Cranes when from the North they fly, The Army of Pygmæan men to charge.

1735 W. Somervile Chace iii. 139 The tall, plump, brawny Youth Curses his cumbrous Bulk; and envies now The short Pygmean Race.

1739 Gentleman's Mag. Feb. 57/1 It is true, he liv'd at a great Distance from the Pygmæan Age.

1822 Ld. Byron Let. 4 May (1979) IX. 155 We live in gigantic and exaggerated times, which make all under Gog and Magog appear pigmean.

1842 Promethean Feb. 33/3 It is a worthless production, a pygmean illiterate dishonour to the cause.

1904 Speaker 21 May 173/1 The expenditure of Japan..has been on a pigmean scale compared with that of Russia.

1975 Amer. Anthropologist 77 378/1 Mr. Hallet's theme is simple enough:..that..mankind itself derives from a pygmean ancestry.

2005 Scotsman (Nexis) 2 Sept. 70 Gordon over the next two years stretched from 5ft 9in—for a goalkeeper, almost pygmean—to the 6ft 4in human tower block he is today.