pigmy
noun · adjective
Simple meaning
A member of one of different Ancient Equatorial African tribal peoples, notable for their very short stature.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
pigmeeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈpɪɡmi
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A member of one of various Ancient Equatorial African tribal peoples, notable for their very short stature.
adjective
Relating or belonging to the Pygmy people.
Word at a Glance
- Typical Use
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A member of one of various Ancient Equatorial African tribal peoples, notable for their very short stature.
Used this way, pigmy is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in historical writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Historical writing
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Low plant with crowded narrow succulent leaves and fairly large deep pink axillary flowers that seem to sit on the ground.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: relating or belonging to the Pygmy people
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.