Minutus

Part of speech: adjective, noun

Definitions

1. Relating to something extremely small or minute in size or detail; referring to a short segment of time such as a minute; describing a precise, finely detailed observation or record
2. Pertaining to very tiny or minuscule dimensions; indicating a temporal unit consisting of sixty seconds; connected to careful and exact documentation or description
3. Characterizing something diminutive or finely detailed; associated with a brief measure of time; involving thorough and meticulous notation or account

Etymology: "Minutus" is the Latin source of the English "minute," and it is an adjective meaning "small" or "little," formed from the past participle of "minuere," "to lessen or diminish." That verb is the root of "minus" in its older sense of "less," so the word's core idea is shrinking rather than tiny size as such. The Latin "minutus" is a derivative of this root, and its meaning in the sense of "small" was already well established in classical Latin. English took the word in two stages. The adjective "minute," meaning very small, came in from Latin in the late Middle Ages, while the noun for sixtieth part of an hour came from the Medieval Latin "pars minuta prima," the "first small part," reflecting the division of an hour into sixty smaller parts. The sense of a tiny written record, as in "minutes" of a meeting, comes from the Latin "minuta," a rough draft or notes made in small writing, which passed through Medieval Latin and French before reaching English. The "minute" sense of precise detail comes naturally from this same idea of fine, small measure. Every meaning, from a fraction of an hour to a finely recorded note, grows from the original notion of something made smaller.

Synonyms: minute, tiny, small, microscopic, minuscule

Antonyms: large, big, huge, enormous, massive