Dictionary

small-timer en · NOUN

Etymology

Etymology tree English small time Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzios Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English small-timer From small time + -er.

Meanings

1. A person who is limited to small, petty or unimportant things.
   • “If he's smooth, he don't have to worry too much about the cops, because he's such a small-timer, and when they come around, he cooperates. […]” 1997, John Sandford, The Night Crew, Putnam, →ISBN, page 148:
   • She hated Ed Feinberg, the sleazy, lying, blood-sucking small-timer. Still he was a man; if he had called her up in the old days, in Seattle, she'd have entertained him. 1934, Lew Levenson, chapter VIII, in Butterfly Man:
   • The small-timers, as he put it, kept their currency in their homes, in safes, in false ceilings, under beds. When necessary, our tax people know where to look. The big-timers, however, use Swiss banks. 1992, Shashi Tharoor, Show Business: A Novel, page 144:

Forms