bagatelle en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- /ˌbæɡəˈtɛl/
- (Southern-England) audio
Etymology
Borrowed from French bagatelle, from Italian bagattella.
Meanings
-
(countable, uncountable) A trifle; an insubstantial thing.
The repayment of the cost of the western part of the road, whatever it might be, would be a mere bagatelle, for the older provinces would have been enriched by the stimulus given to business by the opening up of the plains,[…]
1879 September 6, “Railway Projects”, in Railway World, 5 (36): 853:Sir C. Oh! dear madam, don't ask me, it's a very foolish song—a mere bagatelle. Char. Oh! Sir Callaghan, I will admit of no excuse.
1782, Charles Macklin, Love a-la-Mode, page 21:[…] the jails were larger and fuller, the number of murders was incomparably greater, the thefts and swindlings in the old country were a bagatelle to the large depredations there […]
1850, Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume 68, page 226:They'd purchased a little house in the eighth arrondissement in Paris that for them was just a bagatelle, since they rarely lived there.
1996, Edmund White, “The tea ceremony”, in Ploughshares, volume 22, number 1, page 190:
-
(countable, uncountable) A short piece of literature or of instrumental music, typically light or playful in character.
One afternoon in 1920. a young pianist sat down in a shuttered room in the capital of defeated Germany and played a Bagatelle by Beethoven.
2007, Norman Lebrecht, The Life And Death of Classical Music, page 7:
-
(uncountable) A game similar to billiards played on an oblong table with pockets or arches at one end only.
For some time they did nothing save box, but at last they went down to the bagatelle room, and played bagatelle for a bit. They marked this advance in civilization by prodding holes in the ceiling with the bagatelle cues, which gave the ceiling the appearance of a cloth target after a Gatling gun had been shooting at it.
1895, Hugh Legge, “The Repton Club”, in John Matthew Knapp, editor, The Universities and the Social Problem, page 139:
- (uncountable) Any of several smaller wooden tabletop games developed from the original bagatelle in which the pockets are made of pins.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| bagatelles | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Deriveds
bagatellize · Russian bagatelle
Relateds
Synonyms
bag of shells · whiffle · trifle · sop · fig · triviality · niff-naff · bagatelle · ticky-tack · pin bagatelle · picayune · trick · white chip · jaw ball · scuddick · fico · toy · bag of shells · dicky-bird · flamfew · flyspeck · dicky · bric-a-brac · hit-a-pin bagatelle · minuity
Translations (57)
it cosina (trifle) · it pinzillacchera (trifle) · nl kleinigheid (trifle) · ga mionrud (trifle) · de Unwichtigkeit (trifle) · de Kleinigkeit (trifle) · nl onbenulligheid (trifle) · de Bagatelle (trifle) · es bagatela (trifle) · es nadería (trifle) · es pequeñez (trifle) · la apinae (trifle) · it bazzeccola (trifle) · ru безделу́шка (trifle) · bg дреболия (trifle) · it minuzia (trifle) · de Geringfügigkeit (trifle) · it pagliuzza (trifle) · fi pikkuseikka (trifle) · es menudencia (trifle) · ca bagatel·la (trifle) · sv petitess (trifle) · ru ме́лочь (trifle) · it inezia (trifle) · ga rud fánach (trifle) · pl bagatela (literature or music) · es bagatela (literature or music) · fr bagatelle (trifle) · es frivolidad (trifle) · it baggianata (trifle) · fi bagatelli (literature or music) · es nimiedad (trifle) · hu bagatell (literature or music) · fr broutille (trifle) · it quisquilia (trifle) · es chuchería (trifle) · es minucia (trifle) · ru пустя́к (trifle) · es fruslería (trifle) · es nonada (trifle) · it banalità (trifle) · sv bagatell (trifle) · eo bagatelo (trifle) · ru багате́ль (literature or music) · fi bagatelle (game) · es futilidad (trifle) · pl bagatela (trifle) · fi fortuna (pin bagatelle) · es billar romano (game) · de Nichtigkeit (trifle) · hu apróság (trifle) · sv småsak (trifle) · hu bagatell (trifle) · sv struntsak (trifle) · it sciocchezza (trifle) · it nonnulla (trifle) · de Belanglosigkeit (trifle)