▪ I. minim, a. and n.
(ˈmɪnɪm)
Forms: 5 mynyn, mynnym, 6 mynym(me, minnum, 6–7 minime, minum, (6 minnem, 7 minem, min(n)om, minimme, (minume), 6– minim.
[ad. L. minim-us smallest, a superlative f. the root min-: see minor. The n. represents various elliptical or absolute uses of the adj. in med.L. Cf. F. minime adj. and n.]
A. adj. Smallest, extremely small. † Of a particle: Atomic. Obs.
| a 1670 Hacket Christian Consolat. ii. in Heber Taylor (1822) I. 108 For nailing our great sins to the cross of Christ, and for acquitting us from the innumerable fry of minim sins. 1684 tr. Bonet's Merc. Compit. xviii. 620/2 [Quick-silver] is a Body most exactly mixt, and its minime Parts do pertinaciously one stick to another. 1690 N. Lee Massacre of Paris iii. ii, Fat Porcpise Bauds, the Mermaids too of Honour, The Minim Pages, all the twinkling Host So fill'd, the Snare of Hell must crack to hold you. 1821 Blackw. Mag. VIII. 663 The savage tribes..sent forth their puny fleets Athirst for blood, and wing'd with minim sails. 1876 Geo. Eliot Dan. Der. v. xxxviii, A minim mammal which you might imprison in the finger of your glove. 1876 R. Bridges Growth of Love lv, For man, a minim jot in time and space. |
B. n.
1. Mus. A symbol for a note half the value of a semibreve and double the value of a crotchet; a note of this value. Also attrib., as minim rest.
In ancient music this note was of the shortest duration, hence its name nota minima; in modern music it is second in value to the semibreve. The symbol is figured with an open head, in shape round, inclining to oval (formerly lozenge-shaped), and with a tail.
| c 1440 Promp. Parv. 338/1 Mynyn' of songys (Harl. MS. 2274, P., mynym), minima. 14.. Proverbs in Antiq. Rep. (1809) IV. 408 He maakithe so his mynnyms fro the square, that it shall sownde wronge. 1550 Marbeck Bk. Com. Prayer noted A ij, The iii. [note is] a prycke and is a mynymme. 1587 Golding De Mornay xii. (1617) 184 Our life is lesse than a short Minim in comparison of a whole song. 1592 Shakes. Rom. & Jul. ii. iv. 22 He fights as you sing pricksong,..he rests his minum, one, two, and the third in your bosom. 1609 Douland Ornith. Microl. 39 A Minime is a Figure like a Sembreefe hauing a tayle, ascending or descending. 1622 Peacham Compl. Gentl. xi. (1634) 101 A minim rest. 1782 Burney Hist. Mus. II. iii. 185 A Long and a Breve..differ no more in their effect on the ear, than a Minim and Crotchet. |
| transf. 1596 Spenser F.Q. vi. x. 28 Great Gloriana..Pardon thy shepheard, mongst so many layes As he hath sung of thee..To make one minime of thy poore handmayd. |
2. Calligraphy. A single down stroke of the pen; esp. in Court- or Secretary-hand, the short down stroke in the letters m, n, u, etc.; also attrib. † to be in one's minims: to be learning to write ‘straight strokes’.
| 1603 Holland Plutarch's Mor. 1029 Those who when they write a running hand in haste, doe not alwaies make out the letters full, but use pricks, minims and dashes. 1607 Dekker & Webster Westw. Hoe ii. i, She tooke her letters very suddenly: and is now in her Minoms. 1612 Brinsley Lud. Lit. 39 Striuing..to make minimes, and such like letters sharp at tops & bottoms, or iust to the proportion of their copies. 1658 Cocker Pen's Triumph 14 For Set Secretary... Your minums must be all alike, as the down-right stroke of the a, the strokes of the i, m, n, u, and the first of the w. 1674 S. Jeake Arith. (1696) 293 And so increasing the Minnoms according to the Index of the Figural Number. c 1680 Cocker Pens Perfection 6 You must shape the nib of your pen to the breadth of the minum stroke. 1771 Luckombe Hist. Printing 254 So far [iiii] they [the Romans] could easily number the miniums [sic] or strokes with a glance of the eye. 1890 Collectanea (O.H.S.) II. 290 Mr. Jacobs reads ‘pointeur’. It might be read ‘poniteur’, there being three minims between the o and the t. |
3. The least possible portion (of something), a ‘jot’; in scientific use, † an atom, minute particle.
| 1592 Nashe Four Lett. Confut. (1593) 54 Canst thou exemplifie vnto mee..one minnum of the particular deuice of his play that I purloind? 1599 ― Lenten Stuffe 28, I vary not a minnum from him. 1657 Trapp Comm. Ps. ii. 12 ‘When his wrath is kindled but a little’. It is sometimes let out in minnums. 1662 Stillingfl. Orig. Sacr. iii. ii. §16 Therefore Tully asks that question, Cur declinet uno minimo, non declinet duobus aut tribus? why only it declines one minime, and not two or three. 1686 Goad Celest. Bodies iii. ii. 440 The Red Earth may be more resolvable into Minims, than a White Chalk, or Marble. 1766 T. Amory Buncle (1770) IV. 94 By impregnating the most generous white wine, with the minims or leasts of antimony. 1884 Public Opinion 5 Sept. 290/2 He has not the smallest intention of..yielding one minim of the rights and interests of Germany. |
4. A creature or thing of the least size or importance. Chiefly used contemptuously of a person. minim of nature, one of the smallest forms of animal life.
| 1590 Bp. Andrewes Serm. (1629) 279 They be the base people, the minims of the world. 1609 Ev. Woman in Hum. ii. i. D 3, What will ye? heere he is, you minime. 1667 Milton P.L. vii. 482 At once came forth whatever creeps the ground..not all Minims of Nature; some of Serpent kinde Wondrous in length. 1679 V. Alsop Melius Inquirendum ii. viii. 367 The Minims of Justice ought to vail to the Magnalia of Charity. 1762 Goldsm. Cit. W. cxv, With what a degree of satirical contempt must they..see..minims, the tenants of an atom, thus arrogating a partnership in the creation of universal nature! 1823 Lamb Elia Ser. ii. Tombs in Abbey, These insignificant pieces of money, these minims to their sight. 1863 Cowden Clarke Shaks. Char. xii. 314 He must be a minim of a historian who confines himself to those facts only. 1873 Browning Red Cott. Nt.-cap 228 This insect on my parapet,—Look how the marvel of a minim crawls! |
5. (With capital initial.) A friar belonging to the mendicant order (Ordo Minimorum Eremitarum) founded by St. Francis of Paula (c. 1416–1507). Also attrib.
| 1546 Langley tr. Pol. Verg. vii. v. 142 b, The order of Minimes or lest brethren were founded by one Franciscus Paula. 1638 Baker tr. Balzac's Lett. (vol. III.) 49 The Fathers of the Minimme Order. 1671 Woodhead St. Teresa ii. xxxv. 232 The Fathers Minims were then come hither to found. a 1718 Penn Maxims Wks. 1726 I. 825 He [the covetous man] always looks like Lent: a sort of Lay-Minim. a 1774 Goldsm. tr. Scarron's Com. Romance (1775) I. 124 Two Minim friars of the Trinity of the Mount..ran to my assistance. 1885 W. W. Roberts Pontif. Decrees Introd. 53 The Minims Le Seur and Jacquier were permitted to bring out the treatise. |
6. (See quot.) [In Fr. minime († couleur de minime, gris de minime, Cotgr.); according to Littré from the colour of the robe of the Minim Friars: see 5.]
| 1659 Howell Vocab. xxv, Minim colour; Minimo, ô color di nocella. 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), Minim or Dark Minim, a brown, tawny, or dun Colour. |
† 7. Printing. A certain small size of type: ? = minion. Obs.
| 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), Minim is also a small sort of Printing-Letter. 1818 in Todd. |
8. The smallest unit of fluid measure, about equivalent to one drop of liquid; the sixtieth part of a fluid drachm. Also attrib., as minim-measure.
| 1809 R. Powell tr. Pharmacopœia (ed. 2) 3 The fluidrachm contains Sixty minims. 1890 Syd. Soc. Lex., Minim⁓measure, a measure usually holding a drachm graduated into sixty parts. 1899 Allbutt's Syst. Med. VI. 37 A minim or two of a..trinitrine solution may often be added. |
9. A very small Roman bronze (or occas. silver) coin, usu. produced locally. Pl. minimi, minims.
| 1896 W. C. Hazlitt Coin Collector ix. 247 Minim, a term which, for want of a better one, has been assigned to a class of bronze money of Roman type, probably of the fourth or fifth century b.c., which may have been of local or provincial origin, and is of unusually small module. 1935 Discovery July 196/2 A hoard of 800 minims, small coins in some cases not more than 5 mm. in diameter, buried beneath the floor of the stage. 1962 C. R. Josset Money in Brit. i. 7 An attempt to overcome the shortage was made by a local production of crude bronze coins which are known as ‘minimi’ because of their smallness. 1971 Daily Tel. 13 July 9/1 Two rare British silver minims, or small coins, of the first century a.d. have been discovered during excavations taking place on a Roman occupation site in Chapel Street, Chichester. |
▪ II. minim
variant of mennom, minnow.