different between plain vs particular

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: pl?n, IPA^(key): /ple?n/, [p?l?e?n]
• Rhymes: -e?n
• Homophone: plane

Etymology 1

From Middle English pleyn, borrowed from Anglo-Norman pleyn, playn, Middle French plain, plein, and Old French plain, from Latin pl?nus (“flat, even, level, plain”).

Alternative forms

• plaine (obsolete)

Adjective

plain (comparative plainer, superlative plainest)

1. (now rare, regional) Flat, level. [from 14th c.]

   • The crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain.

2. Simple.
   1. Ordinary; lacking adornment or ornamentation; unembellished. [from 14th c.]
   2. Of just one colour; lacking a pattern.

   3. Simple in habits or qualities; unsophisticated, not exceptional, ordinary. [from 16th c.]
      • 1654, Henry Hammond, Of Fundamentals

        plain yet pious Christians

      • 1861, Abraham Lincoln, Message to Congress in Special Session, July 4th

        the plain people

   4. (of food) Having only few ingredients, or no additional ingredients or seasonings; not elaborate, without toppings or extras. [from 17th c.]

   5. (computing) Containing no extended or nonprinting characters (especially in plain text). [from 20th c.]
3. Obvious.
   1. Evident to one's senses or reason; manifest, clear, unmistakable. [from 14th c.]
      • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, ch. XV, Practical — Devotional

        In fact, by excommunication or persuasion, by impetuosity of driving or adroitness in leading, this Abbot, it is now becoming plain everywhere, is a man that generally remains master at last.

   2. Downright; total, unmistakable (as intensifier). [from 14th c.]

4. Open.
   1. Honest and without deception; candid, open; blunt. [from 14th c.]
      • The Quaker was no sooner assured by this fellow of the birth and low fortune of Jones, than all compassion for him vanished; and the honest plain man went home fired with no less indignation than a duke would have felt at receiving an affront from such a person.

   2. Clear; unencumbered; equal; fair.
      • 1711, Henry Felton, Dissertation on Reading the Classics

        Our troops beat an army in plain fight.

5. Not unusually beautiful; unattractive. [from 17th c.]

6. (card games) Not a trump.

Synonyms

• (lacking adornment or ornamentation): no-frills, simple, unadorned, unseasoned; see also Thesaurus:bare-bones
• (of just one colour): monochrome
• (not exceptional): normal, ordinary
• (obvious): blatant, ostensible; see also Thesaurus:obvious or Thesaurus:explicit
• (intensifier): consarn, darned, stinking; see also Thesaurus:damned
• (honest and without deception): frank, sincere; see also Thesaurus:honest

Antonyms

• bells and whistles
• decorative
• exotic
• fancy
• ornate

Derived terms

Related terms

• plane
• planar

Translations

Adverb

plain (not comparable)

1. (colloquial) Simply.

   It was just plain stupid.

   I plain forgot.

2. (archaic) Plainly; distinctly.

   Tell me plain: do you love me or no?

Etymology 2

From Anglo-Norman plainer, pleiner, variant of Anglo-Norman and Old French pleindre, plaindre, from Latin plangere, present active infinitive of plang?.

Alternative forms

• plein

Noun

plain (plural plains)

1. (rare, poetic) A lamentation.
   • 1815, Sir Walter Scott, The Lady of the Isles, Canto IV, part IX

     The warrior-threat, the infant's plain,
     The mother's screams, were heard in vain;

Verb

plain (third-person singular simple present plains, present participle plaining, simple past and past participle plained)

1. (reflexive, obsolete) To complain. [13th–19th c.]
   • c. 1390, William Landland, Piers Plowman, Prologue:

     Persones and parisch prestes · pleyned hem to þe bischop / Þat here parisshes were pore · sith þe pestilence tyme […].

2. (transitive, intransitive, now rare, poetic) To lament, bewail. [from 14th c.]

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir J. Harrington to this entry?)

   • c. 1600, Joseph Hall, Satires

     Thy mother could thee for thy cradle set
     Her husband's rusty iron corselet;
     Whose jargling sound might rock her babe to rest,
     That never plain'd of his uneasy nest.

   • 1936, Alfred Edward Housman, More Poems, "XXV", lines 5–9

     Then came I crying, and to-day, / With heavier cause to plain, / Depart I into death away, / Not to be born again.

Related terms

Etymology 3

From Old French plain, from Latin pl?num (“level ground, a plain”), neuter substantive from pl?nus (“level, even, flat”). Doublet of llano, piano, and plane.

Noun

plain (plural plains)

1. An expanse of land with relatively low relief, usually exclusive of forests, deserts, and wastelands.
   • 1961, J. A. Philip. Mimesis in the Sophistês of Plato. In: Proceedings and Transactions of the American Philological Association 92. p. 467.

     For Plato the life of the philosopher is a life of struggle towards the goal of knowledge, towards “searching the heavens and measuring the plains, in all places seeking the nature of everything as a whole”

   Synonyms: flatland, grassland

   Hypernyms: land, terrain

   Hyponyms: prairie, steppe

2. (archaic) Synonym of field in reference to a battlefield.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Arbuthnot to this entry?)
3. (obsolete) Alternative spelling of plane: a flat geometric field.

Usage notes

• As with grassland(s), flatland(s), &c., plains can function as the plural of plain (There are ten principal low plains on Mars) or as its synonym (She lives in the plains), with a vague sense of greater expansiveness.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Verb

plain (third-person singular simple present plains, present participle plaining, simple past and past participle plained)

1. (obsolete, transitive) To level; to raze; to make plain or even on the surface.
   • 1594, Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, London: William Jones,^[1]

     Frownst thou thereat aspiring Lancaster,
     The sworde shall plane the furrowes of thy browes,

   • 1612, George Wither, Prince Henrie’s Obsequies, Elegy 24, in Egerton Brydges (editor), Restituta, Volume I, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme & Brown, 1814, p. 399,^[2]

     Though kept by Rome’s and Mahomet’s chiefe powers;
     They should not long detain him there in thrall:
     We would rake Europe rather, plain the East;
     Dispeople the whole Earth before the doome:

2. (obsolete, transitive) To make plain or manifest; to explain.
   • c. 1608, William Shakespeare, Pericles, Act III, Prologue,^[3]

     What’s dumb in show, I’ll plain with speech.

Anagrams

• Aplin, Lipan, Palin, Pinal, in lap, lapin, plani-

Dalmatian

Etymology

From Latin pl?nus. Compare Italian pieno, Romansch plain, Romanian plin, French plein.

Adjective

plain (feminine plaina)

1. full

French

Etymology

From Old French plain, from Latin pl?nus. Doublet of plan and piano.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pl??/
• Homophones: plains, plein, pleins

Adjective

plain (feminine singular plaine, masculine plural plains, feminine plural plaines)

1. (obsolete) plane

Derived terms

• plain-pied
• plain-chant

Further reading

• “plain” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• alpin, lapin

Middle French

Etymology

From Old French plain, from Latin pl?nus.

Adjective

plain m (feminine singular plaine, masculine plural plains, feminine plural plaines)

1. full (not empty)

Old French

Etymology 1

From Latin pl?nus.

Adjective

plain m (feminine plaine)

1. full (not empty)
   • circa 1170, Chrétien de Troyes, Érec et Énide:

     De tant come ele l'ot veü,

     Que plains estoit de felenie.

     As she had seen

     He was full of evil

   Antonym: vuit

Descendants

• French: plein

Etymology 2

From Latin pl?num (“level ground, a plain”), neuter substantive from pl?nus (“level, even, flat”).

Noun

plain m (oblique plural plainz, nominative singular plainz, nominative plural plain)

1. plain (flat area)

Synonyms

• plaine

Descendants

• ? Dutch: plein
• ? Middle English:
  • English: plain
  • Scots: plain

Etymology 3

From Latin pl?nus (“level, even, flat”).

Adjective

plain m (oblique and nominative feminine singular plaine)

1. flat (not even or mountainous)

Romansch

Alternative forms

• plein (Sursilvan)
• plagn (Sutsilvan, Surmiran)

Etymology

From Latin pl?nus.

Adjective

plain m (feminine singular plaina, masculine plural plains, feminine plural plainas)

1. (Rumantsch Grischun, Puter, Vallader) full

English

Alternative forms

• perticular (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English particuler, from Anglo-Norman particuler, Middle French particuler, particulier, from Late Latin particularis (“partial; separate, individual”), from Latin particula (“(small) part”). Equivalent to particle +? -ar. Compare particle.

Pronunciation

• (rhotic) IPA^(key): /p??t?kj?l?/
• (non-rhotic) IPA^(key): /p??t?kj?l?/
• (US, rhotic, r-dissimilation) IPA^(key): /p??t?kj?l?/
• Hyphenation: par?tic?u?lar
• Rhymes: -?kj?l?(?)

Adjective

particular (comparative more particular, superlative most particular) (also non-comparable)

1. (obsolete) Pertaining only to a part of something; partial.
2. Specific; discrete; concrete.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:specific

   Antonym: general
3. Specialised; characteristic of a specific person or thing.

   Synonyms: optimized, specialistic

   • 1625, Francis Bacon, Of Gardens

     wheresoever one plant draweth such a particular juice out of the earth

4. (obsolete) Known only to an individual person or group; confidential.
   • 1623, William Shakespeare, King Lear, V.1:

     or these domesticke and particular broiles, Are not the question heere.

5. Distinguished in some way; special (often in negative constructions).

6. (comparable) Of a person, concerned with, or attentive to, details; fastidious.

   Synonyms: minute, precise, fastidious; see also Thesaurus:fastidious
7. Concerned with, or attentive to, details; minute; circumstantial; precise.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:meticulous

8. (law) Containing a part only; limited.

9. (law) Holding a particular estate.
10. (logic) Forming a part of a genus; relatively limited in extension; affirmed or denied of a part of a subject.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Further reading

• particular in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Noun

particular (plural particulars)

1. A small individual part of something larger; a detail, a point. [from 15th c.]
2. (obsolete) A person's own individual case. [16th-19th c.]
   • 1658, Henry Hammond, Whole Duty of Man

     temporal blessings, whether such as concern the public […] or such as concern our particular

3. (now philosophy, chiefly in plural) A particular case; an individual thing as opposed to a whole class. (Opposed to generals, universals.) [from 17th c.]

Related terms

• universal
• for one's particular

Translations

Catalan

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin particularis.

Pronunciation

• (Balearic) IPA^(key): /p??.ti.ku?la/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /p?r.ti.ku?la/
• (Valencian) IPA^(key): /pa?.ti.ku?la?/

Adjective

particular (masculine and feminine plural particulars)

1. private
2. particular

Derived terms

• particularment

Related terms

• partícula
• particularitat

Further reading

• “particular” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “particular” in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana.
• “particular” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “particular” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Portuguese

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin particul?ris, corresponding to partícula +? -ar.

Pronunciation

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /p??.ti.ku.?la?/
• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /pa?.?t??i.ku.?la?/, [p??.?t??i.k?.?l?ä?]
• Hyphenation: par?ti?cu?lar

Adjective

particular m or f (plural particulares, comparable)

1. private (concerning, accessible or belonging to an individual person or group)
2. private (not belonging to the government)

   Synonym: privado

   Antonym: público

3. particular; specific

   Synonym: específico

4. particular; distinguished; exceptional

   Synonym: excepcional

Inflection

Derived terms

• em particular

Related terms

• partícula

Spanish

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin particul?ris.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pa?tiku?la?/, [pa?.t?i.ku?la?]

Adjective

particular (plural particulares)

1. specific, particular

   Synonyms: concreto, específico

2. peculiar, strange

   Synonyms: raro, extraño

3. personal

   Synonym: íntimo

4. private

   Synonym: privado

Related terms

• partícula

Noun

particular m (plural particulares)

1. individual, private citizen

Further reading

• “particular” in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014.