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trivial

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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PIE word
*tréyes
  • From Latin triviālis (appropriate to the street-corner, commonplace, vulgar), from trivium (place where three roads meet). Compare trivium, trivia.
  • From the distinction between trivium (the lower division of the liberal arts; grammar, logic and rhetoric) and quadrivium (the higher division of the seven liberal arts in the Middle Ages, composed of geometry, astronomy, arithmetic, and music).[1]

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ˈtɹɪv.i.əl/, [ˈt͡ʃɹɪv.i.əl]
  • Audio (US):(file)

Adjective

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trivial (comparative more trivial, superlative most trivial)

  1. Ignorable; of little significance or value.
    • 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 16, in Vanity Fair [], London: Bradbury and Evans [], published 1848, →OCLC:
      "All which details, I have no doubt, Jones, who reads this book at his Club, will pronounce to be excessively foolish, trivial, twaddling, and ultra-sentimental."
    • 2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, →DOI, page 11:
      In fact, the influence of signage in a certain area may exist anywhere on a continuum from profoundly effective to utterly trivial or completely insignificant, irrespective of the intent motivating the signs.
  2. Commonplace, ordinary.
    • 1842, Thomas De Quincey, “Cicero”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine:
      As a scholar, meantime, he was trivial, and incapable of labour.
  3. Concerned with or involving trivia.
  4. (taxonomy) Relating to or designating the name of a species; specific as opposed to generic.
  5. (mathematics) Of, relating to, or being the simplest possible case.
  6. (mathematics) Self-evident.
  7. Pertaining to the trivium.
  8. (philosophy) Indistinguishable in case of truth or falsity.

Synonyms

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Antonyms

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Derived terms

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Translations

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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Noun

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trivial (plural trivials)

  1. (obsolete) Any of the three liberal arts forming the trivium.
    • c. 1521, John Skelton, Speke Parott:
      Tryuyals, & quatryuyals, ſo ſore now they appayre
      That Parrot the Popagay, hath pytye to beholde
      How the reſt of good lernyng, is roufled vp & trold
    • 1691, [Anthony Wood], Athenæ Oxonienses. An Exact History of All the Writers and Bishops who have had Their Education in the Most Ancient and Famous University of Oxford from the Fifteenth Year of King Henry the Seventh, Dom. 1500, to the End of the Year 1690. [], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: [] Tho[mas] Bennet []:
      St. Edmund was bred in this University in the Trivials and Quadrivials till he was Professor of Arts

References

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Further reading

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Anagrams

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Catalan

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Pronunciation

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Adjective

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trivial m or f (masculine and feminine plural trivials)

  1. trivial

Further reading

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French

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Etymology

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Learned borrowing from Latin triviālis.

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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trivial (feminine triviale, masculine plural triviaux, feminine plural triviales)

  1. trivial (common, easy, obvious)
  2. ordinary, mundane, commonplace
    Synonyms: banal, commun, ordinaire
    Antonyms: nouveau, singulier, rare
  3. inelegant, unrefined (especially of a person's language)
    Synonym: inélégant
    Antonym: raffiné
  4. crass, crude, vulgar, obscene (words, language, behavior, etc.)
    Synonyms: brut, grossier, obscène
    Antonyms: courtois, gentil, poli, subtil

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Anagrams

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Galician

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Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /tɾiˈbjal/ [t̪ɾiˈβ̞jɑɫ]
  • Rhymes: -al
  • Hyphenation: tri‧vial

Adjective

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trivial m or f (plural triviais)

  1. trivial

Derived terms

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German

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Etymology

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Borrowed from French trivial, from Latin triviālis (common).

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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trivial (strong nominative masculine singular trivialer, comparative trivialer, superlative am trivialsten)

  1. trivial (common, easy, obvious)

Declension

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Further reading

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  • trivial” in Duden online
  • trivial” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache

Piedmontese

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Adjective

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trivial

  1. trivial

Portuguese

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Pronunciation

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  • (Brazil) IPA(key): /tɾi.viˈaw/ [tɾi.vɪˈaʊ̯], (faster pronunciation) /tɾiˈvjaw/ [tɾiˈvjaʊ̯]
 

  • Rhymes: (Portugal) -al, (Brazil) -aw
  • Hyphenation: tri‧vi‧al

Adjective

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trivial m or f (plural triviais)

  1. trivial

Derived terms

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Noun

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trivial m (plural triviais)

  1. (informal) a simple everyday meal

Further reading

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  • trivial” in Dicionário Aberto based on Novo Diccionário da Língua Portuguesa de Cândido de Figueiredo, 1913

Romanian

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Etymology

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Borrowed from French trivial.

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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trivial m or n (feminine singular trivială, masculine plural triviali, feminine and neuter plural triviale)

  1. common, ordinary
    Synonyms: de rând, comun, obișnuit, ordinar
  2. obscene, indecent
    Synonyms: obscen, indecent

Declension

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singular plural
masculine neuter feminine masculine neuter feminine
nominative-
accusative
indefinite trivial trivială triviali triviale
definite trivialul triviala trivialii trivialele
genitive-
dative
indefinite trivial triviale triviali triviale
definite trivialului trivialei trivialilor trivialelor

Derived terms

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Spanish

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Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /tɾiˈbjal/ [t̪ɾiˈβ̞jal]
  • Rhymes: -al
  • Syllabification: tri‧vial

Adjective

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trivial m or f (masculine and feminine plural triviales)

  1. trivial
    Synonym: insignificante

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Swedish

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Adjective

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trivial (comparative trivialare, superlative trivialast)

  1. trivial

Declension

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Inflection of trivial
Indefinite positive comparative superlative1
common singular trivial trivialare trivialast
neuter singular trivialt trivialare trivialast
plural triviala trivialare trivialast
masculine plural2 triviale trivialare trivialast
Definite positive comparative superlative
masculine singular3 triviale trivialare trivialaste
all triviala trivialare trivialaste

1 The indefinite superlative forms are only used in the predicative.
2 Dated or archaic.
3 Only used, optionally, to refer to things whose natural gender is masculine.

Derived terms

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References

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