little
Meanings
- Small, not large, limited
- Small, limited in size.
- Short, limited in extent.
- Brief, limited in duration.
- Young, limited in growth.
- Younger, regardless of size or height.
- Undeveloped or underdeveloped, limited in development, particularly (offensive, of a male) in the genitals.
- Small, limited in number, having few members.
- Insignificant, trivial, limited in importance.
- Weak, inferior, unimportant, etc., used to belittle a person.
- Denoting a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
- Used with the name of a place to imply that the inhabitants have an insular attitude and are hostile to those they perceive as foreign.
- Not much.
- Not at all.
- Not much, only a little: only a small amount (of).
- Not much; not a large amount.
- A small amount.
- A child, particularly an infant.
- An adult in a child-like role, or in the more junior of two paired roles.
- A newly initiated member of a sorority or fraternity, who is mentored by a big.
- The participant who acts out the younger role.
- One who has mentally age regressed to a childlike state.
- Ellipsis of little go (“type of examination”).
- A characteristical surname.
- An unincorporated community in Breathitt County, Kentucky, United States, named after the local Little family.
- An unincorporated community in Tyler County, West Virginia, United States.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English litel, litell, luitel, lutel, lutil, luytel, from Old English lȳtel, lyttel, from Proto-West Germanic *lūtil (“little”), from *lūtan (“to bow down, lout”), from Proto-Germanic *lūtaną (“to bow down, lout”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, crouch, duck”), equivalent to lout + -le. Cognates Cognate with Yola lethel, litha, lithel, lythea (“little”), North Frisian letj (“little, small”), Saterland Frisian litje (“little, small”), West Frisian lyts (“little, small”), Dutch luttel (“few, little, mere”), German lütt, lützel (“little, small”), Low German lütt, lüttje (“little, small”), Danish liden, lille (“little, small”), Elfdalian litn (“small”), Faroese lítil (“little, small”), Icelandic lítill (“little, small”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish liten (“little, small”), Crimean Gothic lista (“insufficient, very little”), Gothic 𐌻𐌴𐌹𐍄𐌹𐌻𐍃 (leitils, “little, small”); also Albanian lus, lut (“to beg, plead, request”), Lithuanian liūdnas (“sad, sorrowful”), Bulgarian and Macedonian луд (lud, “crazy, insane, mad”), Serbo-Croatian лу̑д, lȗd (“crazy”). Related also to Old English lūtan (“to bow, bend low”); and perhaps to Old English lytiġ (“deceitful”), Gothic 𐌻𐌹𐌿𐍄𐍃 (liuts, “deceitful”). More at lout.