▪ I. manikin
(ˈmænɪkɪn)
Forms: 6 manneken, 8 manekin, manequine, 9 mannakin, man(n)equin, 7– manakin, man(n)ikin.
[a. Du. manneken, dim. of man man n.1: see -kin. App. first taken from Du. in sense 2 b; some of the forms represent the Fr. spelling mannequin.]
1. A little man (often contemptuous); a dwarf, pygmy. Also fig.
| 1601 Shakes. Twel. N. iii. ii. 57 This is a deere Manakin to you Sir Toby. 1609 B. Jonson Sil. Wom. i. iii, O, that's a precious Mannikin! 1653 Dissert. de Pace iv. 18 Shall we little manikins prescribe a law to his most free arbitrement? a 1700 B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Mannikin, a Dwarf. 1762 Beattie Pigm. & Cranes 97 Manikins with haughty step advance. 1840 W. H. Ainsworth Tower Lond. ii. xxxv, ‘What is it?’ replied the good-humoured giant, yawning as if he would have swallowed the teazing mannikin. 1843 Lytton Last Bar. iii. viii, Gloucester, the lynx-eyed mannikin, is there. 1894 Q. Rev. Jan. 213 Men become undignified and little-minded, local manikins. |
2. † a. gen. A little figure of a man. Obs.
| 1601 Holland Pliny II. 484 Prettie images or mannikins resembling cookes, which he termed Magiriscia. 1629 in Archæologia XLVIII. 212 One gilt shipp and cover with a manikin on the topp. |
b. An artist's lay figure.
| 1570 Dee Math. Pref. 32 Thus, of a Manneken (as the Dutch painters terme it) in the same Symmetrie, may a Giant be made. 1730–6 Bailey (folio), Manequine (with Painters, &c.), a little statue or model usually made of wax or wood, the junctures whereof are so contrived, that it may be put into any attitude at pleasure. 1762–71 H. Walpole Vertue's Anecd. Paint. (1786) V. 38 The use of the manekin or layman for disposing draperies. 1850 J. Leitch tr. C. O. Müller's Anc. Art §69 (ed. 2) 38 These wooden figures..had decidedly more resemblance to puppets (manequins) than to works of cultivated plastic art. 1858 Simmonds Dict. Trade, Manequin, an artist's model of wood or wax. 1900 Dr. Dillon in Gd. Words July 451/2 ‘He [the Tsar] is as wiry as a mannequin’, said an officer to me. |
c. A model of the human body used for exhibiting the anatomical structure or for demonstrating surgical operations.
| 1831 E. Baldwin Ann. Yale Coll. 263 The dry preparations, and particularly an apparatus called a manikin, are used for the demonstrations. This manikin is a very perfect and ingenious piece of mechanism, constructed in Paris, representing a male figure of the full size. 1895 Arnold & Sons' Catal. Surg. Instr. 523 Obstetric Manikin including a natural female pelvis, with leather foetus and placenta. |
3. (Usually in the form manakin.) One of the small and usually gaily-coloured birds of the passerine family Pipridæ, inhabiting the tropical region of America.
Hence, or from the Du. source, the mod.L. Manacus designating one genus of this family.
crested manakin, golden manakin, Peruvian manakin, rock manakin, species of the genus Rupicola. spotted manakin, the Australian Pardalotus punctatus or diamond-bird.
| 1743 Edwards Nat. Hist. Birds I. 21 The Golden-headed Black Tit-mouse... I have seen Dutch Drawings of these Birds, entitled, Manakins, which is a name the Hollanders give to some European Birds also. 1774 Goldsm. Nat. Hist. (1776) V. 354 The beauty of the little tribe of Manikin birds. 1781 Pennant Genera of Birds 64 Crested Manakin..Golden-headed Manakin. 1782 Latham Gen. Syn. Birds II. ii. 519 Peruvian Manakin. Ibid. 534 Tuneful Manakin. 1825 Waterton Wand. S. Amer. (1882) 26 When the fruit of the fig is ripe the manikin is on the tree from morn till eve. 1832 Macgillivray tr. Humboldt's Trav. xix. 282 The rocks, among which the Golden Manakin (Pipra rupicola), one of the most beautiful birds of the tropics, builds its nest. 1840 Penny Cycl. XVIII. 178/2 The spotted manakins of New Holland. 1855 Kingsley Westw. Ho! xxiii, The rock manakin, with its saffron plumage. 1896 Newton Dict. Birds 892 (Article Song), The whip-cracking of the Manakin. |
4. attrib. or as adj. Dwarf, pygmy, diminutive, undersized; puny.
| 1840 Hood Kilmansegg, Birth i, One little manikin thing Survives to wear many a wrinkle. 1844 Disraeli Coningsby ii. i, The manikin grasp of the English ministry. 1863 W. C. Baldwin Afr. Hunting 380, I have shot..a splendid old manikin ostrich. Ibid. 410, I shot a very fine old manikin lion. 1884 D. G. Mitchell Wet days & Lesser P., Theocritus 22 Boors indeed; but they are live boors, and not manikin shepherds. 1898 J. Hollingshead Gaiety Chron. i. 2 Unlike Shakespeare, I have preserved the result of my mannikin efforts. |
▪ II. manikin, -kinnes
var. manykin, -kins. Obs.