Adjacent Words

niggling definitions

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WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: (informal) small and of little importance; "a fiddling sum of money"; "a footling gesture"; "our worries are lilliputian compared with those of countries that are at war"; "a little (or small) matter"; "a dispute over niggling details"; "limited to petty enterprises"; "piffling efforts"; "giving a police officer a free meal may be against the law, but it seems to be a picayune infraction" [syn: fiddling, footling, lilliputian, little, niggling, piddling, piffling, petty, picayune, trivial]

Merriam Webster's

adjective Date: 1599 petty; also bothersome or persistent especially in a petty or tiresome way <niggling injuries> • niggling noun • nigglingly adverb

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 troublesome or irritating in a petty way. 2 trifling or petty. Derivatives: nigglingly adv.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Niggle Nig"gle, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Niggled; p. pr. & vb. n. Niggling.] [Dim. of Prov. E. nig to clip money; cf. also Prov. E. nig a small piece.] To trifle with; to deceive; to mock. [Obs.] --Beau. & Fl.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Niggling Nig"gling, n. Finicky or pottering work; specif. (Fine Arts), minute and very careful workmanship in drawing, painting, or the like, esp. when bestowed on unimportant detail.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

A niggling injury or worry is small but bothers you over a long period of time. Both players have been suffering from niggling injuries. ...a niggling worry that the cheap car is also the one that will cause endless trouble. ADJ: usu ADJ n

1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue

Cutting awkwardly, trifling; also accompanying with a woman.

Moby Thesaurus

Mickey Mouse, adverse criticism, advertent, agog, alert, all ears, all eyes, animadversion, annoying, aspersion, assiduous, attentive, aware, bad notices, bad press, captious, captiousness, careful, carping, cavil, caviling, censoriousness, concentrated, conscious, critical, criticism, cynical, diligent, earnest, exception, faultfinding, finical, finicking, finicky, flak, frivolous, fussy, hairsplitting, heedful, hit, home thrust, hostile criticism, hypercritical, hypercriticalness, hypercriticism, imputation, inconsequential, insignificant, intense, intent, intentive, irksome, irritating, jerkwater, knock, measly, meticulous, mindful, nagging, nice, niggle, nit, nit-picking, nugatory, obloquy, observant, observing, on the ball, on the job, one-horse, open-eared, open-eyed, openmouthed, overcritical, overcriticalness, paltry, peanut, pestering, pettifogging, petty, picayune, picayunish, piddling, piffling, poky, priggishness, punk, puny, quibble, quibbling, rap, reflection, regardful, reproachfulness, slam, small-beer, small-time, stricture, swipe, taking exception, tinhorn, trichoschistic, trichoschistism, trifling, trivial, troublesome, two-bit, two-by-four, ultracritical, unimportant, vexatious, vexing, watchful, worrisome, worrying