odds and ends
- miscellaneous items, matters, etc.
- fragments; remnants; scraps; bits.
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Origin of odds and ends
First recorded in 1740–50
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Related Words
assortment, debris, hodgepodge, jumble, litter, medley, melee, miscellany, mishmash, motley, olio, patchwork, potpourri, rags, refuse, remainder, remains, rest, rubbish, rummageExamples from the Web for odds and ends
Historical Examples
Some talked frocks, some music, some picture-palaces, some odds-and-ends.
Nights in LondonThomas Burke
So when they got home her godmother went to her odds-and-ends drawer.
A Great Emergency and Other TalesJuliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
Poor little gentlefolk, the odds-and-ends of existence, the pence and threepenny bits of human life!
Memoirs of My Dead LifeGeorge Moore
Very frequently the odds-and-ends corner of the garden is the most attractive feature in it.
Amateur GardencraftEben E. Rexford
A grated floor formed a small chamber immediately under the roof, where baskets and odds-and-ends are stowed away.
In the Andamans and NicobarsC. Boden Kloss
odds and ends
- miscellaneous items or articles
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Idioms and Phrases with odds and ends
odds and ends
Miscellaneous items, fragments and remnants, as in I've finished putting everything away, except for a few odds and ends. This expression may have originated as odd ends in the mid-1500s, meaning “short leftovers of some material” (such as lumber or cloth). It had acquired its present form and meaning by the mid-1700s.
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The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.