puny

From Middle French puisné. See puisne.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /pjuːni/
• Rhymes: -uːni

• Audio (UK)

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puny (comparative punier, superlative puniest)

1. Of inferior size, strength or significance; small, weak, ineffective.

   You puny earthlings are no match for Ming the Merciless!

   • Shakespeare

     A puny subject strikes at thy great glory.

   • Keble

     Breezes laugh to scorn our puny speed.

• See also Thesaurus:scrawny

puny (plural punies)

1. (obsolete, Oxford University slang) A new pupil at a school etc.; a junior student.
   • c. 1610, anonymous, “The Election of the Prince”, in Boas Frederick Samuel, editor, The Christmas Prince, London: Malone Society, published 1923, page 3:

     […] others to make sporte w^th all of this last sorte were they whome they call Fresh-menn Punies of the first yeare, […]

2. (obsolete) A younger person.
   • 1603, John Florio, transl.; Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in The Essayes, […], book II, printed at London: By Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], OCLC 946730821:

     a law that the eldest or first borne child shall succeed and inherit all: where nothing at all is reserved for Punies, but obedience […].

3. (obsolete) A beginner, a novice.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Fuller to this entry?)

4. (archaic) An inferior person; a subordinate.

• (new pupil): fresher, freshman, new bug, novi (Tonbridge School), shadow (Westminster School)
• (beginner): newb, rookie, tenderfoot; see also Thesaurus:beginner
• (subordinate): junior, underling, vassal

• punny – relating to a pun

From Old Occitan, from Latin pugnus, from Proto-Indo-European *puǵnos, *puḱnos, from *pewǵ-, *peuḱ- (“prick, punch”).

• (Balearic, Central, Valencian) IPA^(key): /ˈpuɲ/

puny m (plural punys)

1. fist

• punyal

• “puny” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “puny” in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana.
• “puny” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “puny” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.