pinprick

[ pin-prik ]

/ ˈpɪnˌprɪk /

noun

any minute puncture made by a pin or the like.

a negligible irritation or annoyance.

Nearby words

Origin of pinprick

First recorded in 1745–55; pin + prick

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for pinprick

The gap between rhetoric and action was on vivid display this weekend with pinprick U.S. strikes in northern Iraq.
Obama's Iraq-Syria Dilemma: No Force Now on the Ground Can Beat ISIS|Jamie Dettmer|August 26, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The offence itself seemed a pinprick beside the rankle of the wound to her pride.
Rest Harrow|Maurice Hewlett
Used as he had become, the past two years, to pinpricks of this sort, his colour betrayed how much the present pinprick hurt him.
The Brentons|Anna Chapin Ray
The cavalry horses and transport animals suffered from bursati, and even a pinprick expanded into a large open sore.
The River War|Winston S. Churchill

Besides, to shoot a mere amateur in Chouannerie would be as absurd as to fire on a balloon when a pinprick would disinflate it.
The Chouans|Honore de Balzac
And now thou art boasting aloud over this pinprick, which harms me not at all.
Stories from the Iliad|H. L. Havell

British Dictionary definitions for pinprick

pinprick

/ (ˈpɪnˌprɪk) /

noun

a slight puncture made by or as if by a pin

a small irritation

verb

(tr) to puncture with or as if with a pin

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

Word Origin and History for pinprick

pinprick

also pin-prick, 1851, from pin (n.) + prick (n.). Used figuratively of petty irritations from 1885. Earlier pin's prick (1825).