minor
/ˈmaɪ.nəɹ/ adjective B1- Lesser, smaller in importance, size, degree, seriousness, or significance compared to another option, particularly · of minor importance· a minor poet
- Underage, not having reached legal majority. · The defendant resides at 123 Fake Street with his partner and two minor children.
- Not serious, not involving risk of death, permanent injury, dangerous surgery, or extended hospitalization. · She suffered a minor injury.· There was minor bruising.
- Smaller by a diatonic semitone than the equivalent major interval. · The musical interval between C and E♭ is a minor third while C to E is a major third.
- Incorporating a minor third interval above the (in scales) tonic or (in chords) root note, (also figurative) tending to produce a dark, discordant, sad, or pensive effect.
- Aeolian, natural minor.
- Of or related to a minor, a secondary area of undergraduate study. · The minor requirements only involve about 20 hours of classes.
- Of or related to a minor, a determinate obtained by deleting one or more rows and columns from a matrix.
Phrasal verbs and expressions
From the library
She was looking very pretty herself on this particular night in a dress of the lovely wild-rose pink, from which Anne was forever debarred; but she was not to take any part in the concert, so her appearance was of minor importance.
Rare birds, retaining their most brilliant plumage, enormous fish, spread upon massive silver dishes, together with every wine produced in the Archipelago, Asia Minor, or the Cape, sparkling in bottles, whose grotesque shape seemed to give an additional flavor to the draught,—all these, like one of the displays with which Apicius of old gratified his guests, passed in review before the eyes of the astonished Parisians, who understood that it was possible to expend a thousand louis upon a dinner for ten persons, but only on the condition of eating pearls, like Cleopatra, or drinking refined gold, like Lorenzo de’ Medici.
I have, therefore, received a very good education, and have been treated by these kidnappers very much as the slaves were treated in Asia Minor, whose masters made them grammarians, doctors, and philosophers, in order that they might fetch a higher price in the Roman market.”
“Well, in investigating this minor affair we must not lose sight of our main inquiry.
Other matches
Learn minor in real texts
With a free account, hover any word in the library for its meaning, hear it read aloud, save words for review timed to your memory, and see how much of each book you already know.