Crossword clues for lilliputian
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Lilliputian \Lil`li*pu"tian\ (l[i^]l`l[i^]*p[=u]"shan), n.
One belonging to a very diminutive race described in Swift's ``Voyage to Lilliput'' or ``Gulliver's Travels''.
Hence: A person or thing of very small size.
Lilliputian \Lil`li*pu"tian\, a.
Of or pertaining to the imaginary island of Lilliput described by Swift, or to its inhabitants.
Hence: Of very small size; diminutive; insignificant; dwarfed.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"diminutive, tiny," literally "pertaining to Lilliput," the fabulous island whose inhabitants were six inches high, a name coined by Jonathan Swift in "Gulliver's Travels" (1726). Swift left no explanation of the origin of the word.
Wiktionary
a. 1 Very small, diminutive 2 Trivial, petty n. A very small person or being.
Usage examples of "lilliputian".
Sarah had always had a particular feeling for rock plants, the minute daffodils and pansies, the miniature juniper trees under which only a Lilliputian Elisha could have concealed himself, the aubretia, the tiny toad-flax, and all those plants that make such a brave show in miniature.
For the next two or three minutes, like Gulliver among the Lilliputians, I engaged in battle with this cartoonish troop, swinging the torch in wild arcs, brushing the sweeps off my clothing, crushing the littlest ones underfoot.
Lilliputian, a chit, a fingerling, a pigwidgeon, a mite, a dandiprat, a micromorph, an homunculus, a dapperling, a small fry or someone with bad posture, weighted down with the cares of the world?
Some time after, asking a friend at court how they came to fix on that determinate number, he told me that his majesty's mathematicians, having taken the height of my body by the help of a quadrant, and finding it to exceed theirs in the proportion of twelve to one, they concluded from the similarity of their bodies, that mine must contain at least 1724 of theirs, and consequently would require as much food as was necessary to support that number of Lilliputians.
Finally, you will note the fidgetings and scratchings which appear to our Lilliputian perceptions as earthquakes and convulsions.
For, since the conjunction of male and female is founded upon the great law of nature, in order to propagate and continue the species, the Lilliputians will needs have it, that men and women are joined together, like other animals, by the motives of concupiscence.
For the Lilliputians think nothing can be more unjust, than for people, in subservience to their own appetites, to bring children into the world, and leave the burthen of supporting them on the public.
It might have pleased fortune, to have let the Lilliputians find some nation, where the people were as diminutive with respect to them, as they were to me.
Everyone was an American now, or at least Americanized: Indians, Iranians, Uzbeks, Japanese, Lilliputians, all.
For, since the conjunction of male and female is founded upon the great law of nature, in order to propagate and continue the species, the Lilliputians will needs have it, that men and women are joined together like other animals, by the motives of concupiscence.
Sometimes we approach them and sometimes we retreat and at one dramatic phase we sailed close-by and there were Lilliputians half-way up one of them, being busy.
Katalin gave him an elfin smile and blew a Lilliputian smoke ring.