Meaning

10 senses

  1. (countable)A person or thing that has no equal; a paragon.

  2. (countable, uncountable)The blue underwing or Clifden nonpareil (Catocala fraxini), a species of moth distributed across the Palearctic; also (obsolete) any of a number of moths of other species.

  3. (US, countable, uncountable)A painted bunting (Passerina ciris), a brightly-coloured finch native to North America.

  4. (US, broadly, countable, dated, uncountable)A small pellet of white or coloured sugar used as decoration on baked goods and candy.

  5. (US, broadly, countable, uncountable)A small, flat chocolate drop covered with such pellets of sugar, similar to a comfit.

    a flat disk of chocolate covered with beads of colored sugar

  6. (US, broadly, countable, uncountable)A caper (“pickled edible flower bud”) of the smallest size.

  7. (historical, uncountable)A size of type between ruby and emerald (or, in the United States, between agate and minion), standardized as 6-point; (countable) a slug of this size.

    Nonpareille

    нонпарельnonparelʹ

  8. (Australia, archaic, countable, uncountable)In full nonpareil parrot: an eastern rosella, of species Platycercus eximius, a rosella (parrot) native to southeastern Australia.

  9. (archaic, countable, uncountable)In full nonpareil apple: an apple tasting both sweet and tart which ripens very late in the season; also, the tree producing this fruit.

  10. (US, archaic, countable, uncountable)Any of various types of small sweets.

Translations

5 languages
Русский
By meaning 1
size of type standardized at 6-point; slug of this size:
Deutsch
By meaning 1
size of type standardized at 6-point; slug of this size:

Origin

From Late Middle English non-parail (“unparalleled, nonpareil”) [and other forms], from Mi

From Late Middle English non-parail (“unparalleled, nonpareil”) [and other forms], from Middle French nonpareille, nonpareil (“unparalleled”) (obsolete), from non- (prefix meaning ‘not’) + pareil (“alike, like, same”). Pareil is derived from Old French pareil, from Late Latin pāriculus (“equal; like; of a number: even”), from Latin pār (“equal; like; of a number: even; suitable”) + -culus (a variant of -ulus (suffix forming diminutives)).

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Forms

plural: nonpareils

Synonyms

9 synonyms
hundreds and thousandssprinklesnonpareille
Close in meaning

Lessons for this word

1 lessons

See also

neighbours in the dictionary
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nonpareil — meaning, examples, forms, synonyms | Krumeto