Adjacent Words

Petty definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

PET'TY, a. Small; little; trifling; inconsiderable; as a petty trespass; a petty crime.
1. Inferior; as a petty prince.
We usually write petty constable, petty jury, petty larceny, petty treason. [See Petit.]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: inferior in rank or status; "the junior faculty"; "a lowly corporal"; "petty officialdom"; "a subordinate functionary" [syn: junior-grade, lower-ranking, lowly, petty, secondary, subaltern]
2: (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]
3: contemptibly narrow in outlook; "petty little comments"; "disgusted with their small-minded pettiness" [syn: petty, small-minded] n
1: larceny of property having a value less than some amount (the amount varies by locale) [syn: petit larceny, petty larceny, petty] [ant: grand larceny, grand theft]

Merriam Webster's

adjective (pettier; -est) Etymology: Middle English pety small, minor, alteration of petit Date: 14th century 1. having secondary rank or importance ; minor, subordinate 2. having little or no importance or significance 3. marked by or reflective of narrow interests and sympathies ; small-minded • pettily adverb • pettiness noun

Merriam Webster's

biographical name Sir William 1623-1687 English politician economist

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. (pettier, pettiest) 1 unimportant; trivial. 2 mean, small-minded; contemptible. 3 minor; inferior; on a small scale (petty princes). 4 Law (of a crime) of lesser importance (petty sessions) (cf. COMMON, GRAND). Phrases and idioms: petty bourgeois = PETIT BOURGEOIS. petty bourgeoisie = petite bourgeoisie. petty cash money from or for small items of receipt or expenditure. petty jury a jury of 12 persons who try the final issue of fact in civil or criminal cases and pronounce a verdict. petty officer a naval NCO. petty treason see TREASON. Derivatives: pettily adv. pettiness n. Etymology: ME pety, var. of PETIT

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Petty Pet"ty, a. [Compar. Pettier; superl. Pettiest.] [OE. petit, F. petit; probably of Celtic origin, and akin to E. piece. Cf. Petit.] Little; trifling; inconsiderable; also, inferior; subordinate; as, a petty fault; a petty prince. --Denham. Like a petty god I walked about, admired of all. --Milton. Petty averages. See under Average. Petty cash, money expended or received in small items or amounts. Petty officer, a subofficer in the navy, as a gunner, etc., corresponding to a noncommissionned officer in the army. Note: For petty constable, petty jury, petty larceny, petty treason, See Petit. Syn: Little; diminutive; inconsiderable; inferior; trifling; trivial; unimportant; frivolous.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(pettier, pettiest) 1. You can use petty to describe things such as problems, rules, or arguments which you think are unimportant or relate to unimportant things. He was miserable all the time and rows would start over petty things. ...endless rules and petty regulations... ADJ: usu ADJ n [disapproval] 2. If you describe someone's behaviour as petty, you mean that they care too much about small, unimportant things and perhaps that they are unnecessarily unkind. I think that attitude is a bit petty. ADJ: usu v-link ADJ [disapproval] • pettiness Never had she met such spite and pettiness. N-UNCOUNT 3. Petty is used of people or actions that are less important, serious, or great than others. ...petty crime, such as handbag-snatching and minor break-ins. ADJ: ADJ n

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Little, small, trifling, trivial, frivolous, inconsiderable, unimportant, insignificant, slight, diminutive, of small moment, of small account. 2. Inferior, unimportant.

Moby Thesaurus

Mickey Mouse, abject, abominable, arrant, atrocious, authoritarian, base, beggarly, bickering, bigot, bigoted, borne, captious, casual, caviling, cheap, cheesy, choplogic, close, closed, constricted, contemptible, cramped, creedbound, crummy, cursory, deaf, deaf to reason, debased, deficient, degraded, depraved, depthless, despicable, dinky, dirty, disgusting, equivocatory, evasive, execrable, fanatical, few, flagrant, footling, foul, fulsome, grave, gross, grudging, hairsplitting, hedging, heinous, hidebound, illiberal, imperfect, impertinent, inadequate, incompetent, inconsequent, inconsequential, inconsiderable, inessential, inferior, insignificant, insufficient, insular, irrelevant, jerkwater, light, little, little-minded, logic-chopping, low, low-down, lumpen, maladroit, mangy, meager, mean, mean-minded, mean-spirited, measly, mediocre, mingy, miniature, minor, miserable, miserly, monstrous, narrow, narrow-hearted, narrow-minded, narrow-souled, narrow-spirited, nearsighted, nefarious, negligible, niggardly, niggling, nit-picking, no great shakes, not comparable, not in it, nugatory, obnoxious, odious, of no account, one-horse, out of it, paltering, paltry, parochial, parsimonious, peanut, peddling, pettifogging, picayune, picayunish, piddling, piffling, pimping, poky, poor, provincial, punk, puny, purblind, pussyfooting, quibbling, rank, reptilian, scabby, scrubby, scruffy, scummy, scurvy, shabby, shallow, shoddy, shoestring, short, shortsighted, shuffling, skin-deep, slight, small, small-beer, small-minded, small-time, squalid, stingy, straitlaced, stuffy, superficial, tight, tight-fisted, tinhorn, tiny, trichoschistic, trifling, trinal, trivial, two-bit, two-by-four, twopenny-halfpenny, uncatholic, uncharitable, unchivalrous, unconsidered, ungenerous, unimportant, unliberal, unmentionable, unskillful, vile, wretched