Noun: smidgen
| Singular | smidgen |
| Plural | smidgens |
Sample Sentences
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Move it a smidgen to the right.
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Would you like some more cake? ―I’ll have a smidgen.
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Unkle Will says when he tould her to mind the siggering in the Crock,—she run to the Spence for a smidgen of skalded cream. [[1824], Robin Baragwaneth [pseudonym], The Wooden Horse, for the Rounder, and the Horse without a Head. […], Penzance, Cornwall: […] J. Thomas, →OCLC, page 10:]
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It's jest a meracle we wa'n't all blowed to smidgens, the hull b'ilin' lot of us. [1889 February, “The Pipeses’ Party”, in Frank Leslie’s Pleasant Hours. Devoted to Light and Entertaining Literature, volume XLVI, New York, N.Y.: Mrs. Frank Leslie [Miriam Leslie], […], →OCLC, page 473, column 2:]
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He didn't look the least smidgen like our Mart Mayo, but if they was both on the track in a lyin match, whilst he might not beat old Mart, I am satisfied he would make the track devilish dusty for a few heats anyhow. [1898, Francis Bartow Lloyd, “The Farmer and the Broncho”, in Lily C. Lloyd, editor, Sketches of Country Life: Humor, Wisdom and Pathos from the “Sage of Rocky Creek” […], Birmingham, Ala.: Press of Roberts & Son, →OCLC, page 80:]
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I could listen to forty million men like this candidate expound his views and it wouldn't alter me one smidgen in the belief that Carson Dwight has acted only as a true Christian would. [1907 September, Will[iam] N[athaniel] Harben, chapter XXXVII, in Mam’ Linda […], New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers, →OCLC, page 304:]
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Aw right, you go right in and tell 'em the truth, all of it, every last smidgen. [1921, William Patterson White, “The Showdown”, in The Heart of the Range, Garden City, N.Y.; Toronto, Ont.: Doubleday, Page & Company, →OCLC, page 187:]
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['][T]he girl's a pill like Phyllis, who always does what Daddy tells her.' / 'No will of her own?' / 'Not a smidgeon.['] [1960, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, chapter 4, in Jeeves in the Offing, Harmondsworth, Middlesex [London]: Penguin Books, published 1963 (1975 printing), →OCLC, page 37:]
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In fifty years, did you ever have a vacation, you little, silly, half-pint, smidgin of a wife? [1952 September 19, John Steinbeck, chapter 23, in East of Eden, New York, N.Y.: The Viking Press, →OCLC, book 3, section 3, page 289:]
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Lucille wore one of those little smidgins of hats held on by inturned combs. [1962 July, John Steinbeck, “Part 1”, in Travels with Charley in Search of America, London: William Heinemann, published 1962, →OCLC, page 106:]
Nouns inflected like smidgen
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
1. Origin uncertain; possibly from smitch (“(originally Scotland, chiefly US) very small amount or quantity”) + possibly -in (a variant of -ing (suffix forming nouns denoting things considered collectively)). Smitch is possibly:
2. * derived from smitch (“smoke from a burning or smouldering thing; spot of dirt; blemish; dirt, grime”), a variant of smeech (“(southwest England) (dense or pungent) smoke; airborne dust”), from Middle English smeche, smek, smiche (“smoke from a burning or smouldering thing; cloud of smoke; fumes, vapour; smell”), from Old English smēc, smīc (“smoke; steam; vapour”), from Proto-West Germanic *smauki (“smoke”), related to Proto-Germanic *smeukaną (“to fume, smoke”), from Proto-Indo-European *smewgʰ- (“smoke”); or
3. * borrowed from Scots smitch (“smudge, stain; blemish; very small amount, speck, trace; small insignificant person”), possibly a variant of English smutch (“dirty mark, smudge, stain; dirt, grime; slight indication”) (probably related to smudge, ultimate etymology unknown) and influenced by English smit (“(UK, dialectal) a stain”). See: Middle English Nouns '
smeche', Old English Nouns '
smēc', English Nouns '
smutch', English Nouns '
smit'.