English Explanatory Dictionary

particle

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. A very small piece of matter, a fragment; especially, the smallest possible part of something.
  2. Any of various physical objects making up the constituent parts of an atom; an elementary particle or subatomic particle.
  3. A part of speech that has no inherent lexical definition but must be associated with another word to impart meaning, often a grammatical category: for example, the English word to in a full infinitive phrase (to eat) or O in a vocative phrase (O Canada), or as a discourse marker (mmm).
  4. A part of speech which cannot be inflected.
  5. In the Roman Catholic church, a crumb of consecrated bread; also the smaller breads used in the communion of the laity.
  6. A little bit.

Pronunciation

/ˈpɑːtɪk(ə)l/ /ˈpɑɹtɪkəl/ en-us-particle.ogg

Word forms

particle particles

Etymology

From Middle French particule, and its source, Latin particula (“small part, particle”), diminutive of pars (“part, piece”). Semantically displaced native Old English grot whence modern English groat.

Synonyms

bit chip chunk clip crumb crumbling cutting flake fleak fragment hunk lump mammock ort piece piecemeal portion scrap scraplet slice snead snippet steck p-word atom molecule ace atomy aught bissel glimpse dab damn dash diddly glint dot spatter drop dusting fleck glimmer hint flip flyspeck grain halfpennyworth inch iota jot lick mite modicum morceau morsel mote ooch ounce particle pennyworth

Related words

part particular particulate

Derived words

adparticle adverbial particle alpha particle angel particle antiparticle anti-particle astroparticle beta particle bioparticle cascade particle charged particle charged-particle composite particle cosmoparticle delta particle Dirac particle ferroparticle fundamental particle gamma particle geoparticle God particle gravitationally interacting massive particle Higgs particle Hitler particle holoparticle hot particle immunoparticle infraparticle interparticle intraparticle J/psi particle Janus particle K-particle lambda particle lipoviroparticle macroparticle Majorana particle microparticle monoparticle multiparticle multi-particle nanoparticle nobiliary particle Oh-My-God particle OMG particle paraparticle particle accelerator particle-antiparticle particle beam particle-board particle board particled particle decay particle energy particle horizon particle mechanics particle physics particle shower particle statistics particle theory

Translations

Albanian: pjesëz Arabic: أَدَاة Arabic: حَرْف Armenian: եղանակավորող բառ Azerbaijani: ədat Belarusian: часці́ца Belarusian: часьці́ца Bengali: হরফ Bulgarian: части́ца Burmese: ပစ္စည်း Catalan: partícula Chinese Mandarin: 助詞 /助词 Czech: částice Czech: partikule Danish: partikel Dutch: partikel Esperanto: partikulo Estonian: partikkel Finnish: partikkeli French: particule Galician: partícula German: Partikel German: Redeteilchen Greek: μόριο Hebrew: מִלִּית Hungarian: partikula Icelandic: smáorð Interlingua: particula Irish: páirteagal Irish: mír Italian: particella Japanese: 助詞 Japanese: 助辞 Japanese: てにをは Kazakh: демеулік Khmer: និបាត Khmer: អព្យយ Korean: 조사 Kyrgyz: частица Kyrgyz: бөлүкчө Lao: ອະນຸພາກ Latvian: partikula Lithuanian: dalelytė Macedonian: честичка Māori: weu Māori: pūtūmua Māori: pūmahi Mongolian: сул үг Norman: partitchule Norwegian Bokmål: partikkel Pannonian Rusyn: словко Pannonian Rusyn: партикула
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