different between little vs lean

English

Etymology

From Middle English litel, from Old English l?tel, from Proto-Germanic *l?tilaz (“tending to stoop, crouched, little”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, bent, small”), equivalent to lout +? -le. Cognate with Dutch luttel, regional German lütt and lützel, West Frisian lyts, Low German lütt, Old High German luzzil, Middle High German lützel, Old English l?tan (“to bow, bend low”); and perhaps to Old English lytig (“deceitful, lot deceit”), Gothic ???????????????????? (liuts, “deceitful”), ???????????????????????? (lutjan, “to deceive”); compare also Icelandic lítill (“little”), Swedish liten, Danish liden, lille, Gothic ???????????????????????????? (leitils), which appear to have a different root vowel. More at lout.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?l?t?l/, [?l?tl?], [?l?.t???]
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?l?tl?/, [?l?.???], [???.??]
• (General New Zealand) IPA^(key): /?l?tl?/
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /?l?.???/
• Rhymes: -?t?l
• Hyphenation: lit?tle
• Homophone: Littell

Adjective

little (comparative less or lesser or littler, superlative least or littlest)

1. Small in size.

2. Insignificant, trivial.
   1. (offensive) Used to belittle a person.

3. Very young.

4. (of a sibling) Younger.

5. (also Little) Used with the name of a place, especially of a country or its capital, to denote a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
   • 1871 October 18, The One-eyed Philosopher [pseudonym], "Street Corners", in Judy: or the London serio-comic journal, volume 9, page 255 [1]:

     If you want to find Little France, take any turning on the north side of Leicester square, and wander in a zigzag fashion Oxford Streetwards. The Little is rather smokier and more squalid than the Great France upon the other side of the Manche.

   • 2004, Barry Miles, Zappa: A Biography, 2005 edition, ?ISBN, page 5:

     In the forties, hurdy-gurdy men could still be heard in all those East Coast cities with strong Italian neighbourhoods: New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia and Boston. A visit to Baltimore's Little Italy at that time was like a trip to Italy itself.

   • 2020, Richa Bhosale, "Croatian Hall in need of repairs to remain open," Timmins Daily Press:

     "The theatre was bought by the Croatian immigrants as so many immigrants came here in the ’30s and mostly for mining jobs, but in Schumacher itself it was called little Zagreb, and Zagreb is the capital city of Croatia. There were so many of them that they wanted to have their own little community, so they bought the theatre and they renovated it at that time, remodelled it and made it into a Croatian Hall," she explained.

6. Having few members.

7. Short in duration; brief.

   I feel better after my little sleep.

8. Small in extent of views or sympathies; narrow; shallow; contracted; mean; illiberal; ungenerous.

   • The long-necked geese of the world that are ever hissing dispraise, / Because their natures are little.

   • 2001, Nicholas Petsalis-Diomidis, The Unknown Callas: the Greek Years, pg 547.

     Showing unmistakably what a little person he really was, in June 1949 he wrote his newly married daughter with nauseating disregard for the truth

Usage notes

Some authorities regard both littler and littlest as non-standard. The OED says of the word little: "the adjective has no recognized mode of comparison. The difficulty is commonly evaded by resort to a synonym (as smaller, smallest); some writers have ventured to employ the unrecognized forms littler, littlest, which are otherwise confined to dialect or imitations of childish or illiterate speech." The forms lesser and least are encountered in animal names such as lesser flamingo and least weasel.

Antonyms

• (small): large, big
• (young): big
• (younger): big

Derived terms

Translations

Adverb

little (comparative less or lesser, superlative least)

1. Not much.

   We slept very little last night.

   • Little disappointed, then, she turned attention to "Chat of the Social World," gossip which exercised potent fascination upon the girl's intelligence. She devoured with more avidity than she had her food those pretentiously phrased chronicles of the snobocracy […] distilling therefrom an acid envy that robbed her napoleon of all its savour.

2. Not at all.

Antonyms

• much

Translations

Determiner

little (comparative less, superlative least)

1. Not much, only a little: only a small amount (of).

   There is (very) little water left.

   We had very little to do.

Usage notes

• Little is used with uncountable nouns, few with plural countable nouns.
• Little can be used with or without an article. With the indefinite article, the emphasis is that there is indeed some, albeit not much:

We have a little money, so we'll probably get by.

With no article or the definite article (or what), the emphasis is on the scarcity:

We have little money, and little hope of getting more.

The little (or What little) money we have is all going to pay for food and medication, so we can't save any.

See also

• a little

Antonyms

• (not much): much

Translations

Pronoun

little

1. Not much; not a large amount.

   Little is known about his early life.

Noun

little (plural littles)

1. A small amount.

   Can I try a little of that sauce?

   Many littles make a mickle. (Scottish proverb)

   Little did he do to make me comfortable.

   If you want some cake, there's a little in the refrigerator

2. (BDSM, slang) The participant in ageplay who acts out the younger role.
3. (colloquial, college slang) A newly initiated member of a sorority.

Antonyms

• (BDSM): big

Derived terms

• little space

Related terms

• a little
• li'l, li'l', lil
• little by little
• little old
• belittle (cognate verb)

Anagrams

• tillet

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: l?n, IPA^(key): /li?n/
• Rhymes: -i?n
• Homophone: lien

Etymology 1

From Middle English lenen (“to lean”), from Old English hleonian, hlinian (“to lean, recline, lie down, rest”), from Proto-Germanic *hlin?n? (“to lean, incline”), from Proto-Indo-European *?ley-. Cognate via Proto-Germanic with Middle Dutch leunen (“to lean”), German lehnen (“to lean”); via Proto-Indo-European with climate, cline.

Verb

lean (third-person singular simple present leans, present participle leaning, simple past and past participle leaned or (UK) leant)

1. To incline, deviate, or bend, from a vertical position; to be in a position thus inclining or deviating.

2. (copulative) To incline in opinion or desire; to conform in conduct; often with to, toward, etc.
3. Followed by against, on, or upon: to rest or rely, for support, comfort, etc.
4. To hang outwards.
5. To press against.

Derived terms

Related terms

• climate
• cline

Translations

Noun

lean (plural leans)

1. (of an object taller than its width and depth) An inclination away from the vertical.

   The trees had various leans toward gaps in the canopy.

Synonyms

• (inclination away from vertical): tilt

Etymology 2

From Middle English lene (“lean”), from Old English hl?ne (“lean”), (cognate with Low German leen), perhaps from hl?nan (“to cause to lean (due to hunger or lack of food)”), from Proto-Germanic *hlainijan? (“to cause to lean”). If so, then related to Old English hlinian, hleonian (“to lean”).

Adjective

lean (comparative leaner, superlative leanest)

1. (of a person or animal) Slim; not fleshy.

   Synonyms: lithe, svelte, willowy; see also Thesaurus:slender

2. (of meat) Having little fat.

3. Having little extra or little to spare; scanty; meagre.

   Synonyms: insufficient, scarce, sparse; see also Thesaurus:inadequate

4. Having a low proportion or concentration of a desired substance or ingredient.

   Synonyms: deficient, dilute, poor

   Antonym: rich

5. (printing, archaic) Of a character which prevents the compositor from earning the usual wages; opposed to fat.

6. (business) Efficient, economic, frugal, agile, slimmed-down; pertaining to the modern industrial principles of "lean manufacturing"

Derived terms

• leanness
• leansome

Translations

Noun

lean (countable and uncountable, plural leans)

1. (uncountable) Meat with no fat on it.
   • 1639 or earlier, Anon, Jack Sprat

     Jack Sprat would eat no fat, / His wife would eat no lean.

2. (countable, biology) An organism that is lean in stature.
   • 1986, Southwest Fisheries Center (U.S.), Collected Reprints (issue 1)

     The intermediates and leans are the predominant morphotypes found at the SE-NHR seamounts […]

   • 2012, Obesity: New Insights for the Healthcare Professional (page 56)

     Obese Zuckers, compared to leans, consumed more food under free-feeding conditions.

Verb

lean (third-person singular simple present leans, present participle leaning, simple past and past participle leaned)

1. To thin out (a fuel-air mixture): to reduce the fuel flow into the mixture so that there is more air or oxygen.

Etymology 3

From Icelandic leyna? Akin to German leugnen (“deny”). Compare lie (“speak falsely”).

Verb

lean (third-person singular simple present leans, present participle leaning, simple past and past participle leaned)

1. To conceal.

References

Etymology 4

Probably from the verb to lean (see etymology 1 above), supposedly because consumption of the intoxicating beverage causes one to "lean".

Noun

lean (uncountable)

1. (slang, US) A recreational drug based on codeine-laced promethazine cough syrup, popular in the hip hop community in the southeastern United States.

   Synonyms: sizzurp, syrup, purple drank

See also

• lean on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

References

• lean in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• lean in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• Alne, ELAN, Lane, Lena, Nale, Neal, elan, enal, lane, nale, neal, élan

Galician

Verb

lean

1. third-person plural present subjunctive of ler

Irish

Etymology

From Old Irish lenaid (“stays, sticks (to), follows”), from Proto-Celtic *linati (“stick”), from Proto-Indo-European *h?leyH- (“to smear”); compare Latin lin? (“anoint”), l?mus (“mud, slime”), Sanskrit ?????? (lin?ti, “sticks, stays”).

Pronunciation

• (Munster) IPA^(key): /l?an??/
• (Connacht, Ulster) IPA^(key): /l??an?/, /l??an??/

Verb

lean (present analytic leanann, future analytic leanfaidh, verbal noun leanúint, past participle leanta)

1. (transitive, intransitive) follow
2. continue

3. remain
4. endure

Conjugation

• Alternative verbal noun: leanacht (Cois Fharraige)

Derived terms

• folean
• leantóir

Further reading

• "lean" in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, An Gúm, 1977, by Niall Ó Dónaill.
• Gregory Toner, Maire Ní Mhaonaigh, Sharon Arbuthnot, Dagmar Wodtko, Maire-Luise Theuerkauf, editors (2019) , “lenaid”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language

Northern Sami

Pronunciation

• (Kautokeino) IPA^(key): /?lea?n/

Verb

lean

1. inflection of leat:
   1. first-person singular present indicative
   2. past indicative connegative

Old English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /læ???n/

Etymology 1

From Proto-Germanic *laun?, from a suffixed form of Proto-Indo-European *leh?w- (“catch, plunder, profit”). Cognate with Old Frisian l?n, Old Saxon l?n, Dutch loon, Old High German l?n (German Lohn), Old Norse laun (Swedish lön), Gothic ???????????????? (laun). The Indo-European root is also the source of Ancient Greek ???? (leía) (from *?????), Latin lucrum, Old Church Slavonic ???? (lov?) (Russian ??? (lov)), Old Irish lóg, Lithuanian lãvinti.

Noun

l?an n

1. reward

Declension

Derived terms

• i?l?an

Related terms

• l?anian

Etymology 2

From Proto-Germanic *lahan?. Cognate with Old Saxon lahan, Old High German lahan, Old Norse lá, Gothic ???????????????????? (laian).

Verb

l?an

1. (transitive) to blame, fault, reproach

Conjugation

Descendants

• Middle English: *l?en (attested in past tense lough)

Scottish Gaelic

Etymology

From Old Irish lenaid (“stays, sticks (to), follows”), from Proto-Celtic *linati (“stick”), from Proto-Indo-European *h?leyH- (“to smear”); compare Latin lin? (“anoint”), Sanskrit ?????? (lin?ti, “sticks, stays”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??n/

Verb

lean (past lean, future leanaidh, verbal noun leantainn or leanmhainn, past participle leanta)

1. follow
2. continue, proceed

Derived terms

• fo-leantach (“subjunctive”)
• lean air (“continue”)
• ainlean (“persecute”)

Spanish

Verb

lean

1. Second-person plural (ustedes) imperative form of leer.
2. Second-person plural (ustedes) present subjunctive form of leer.
3. Third-person plural (ellos, ellas, also used with ustedes^?) present subjunctive form of leer.

West Frisian

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

lean n (plural leanen, diminutive leantsje)

1. wage, wages, salary
2. reward

Further reading

• “lean”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011