picayune

[Beverly Flanigan]

And I believe creolists trace 'pickaninny' to the same Romance-derived set
of words.

At 03:17 PM 2/25/00 -0500, you wrote:
>In a message dated 2/25/2000 2:54:44 PM, vneufeldt at M-W.COM writes:
>
><< 'picayune' (which goes back to a word meaning money) >>
>
>so says my dicitonary--sorta, i.e., it comes from the name of a small coin,
>ultimately from a Prvencal word of unknown origin. Surely this must somehow
>be related as well to the Spanish word PEQUENYO, meaning 'small' or
>'trivial'? In which case the Spanish borrowed it from the French?