pismire
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of pismire
1350–1400; Middle English pissemyre, equivalent to pisse to urinate + obsolete mire ant, perhaps < Scandinavian (compare Danish myre, Swedish myra ), cognate with Dutch mier; pejorative name from stench of formic acid proper to ants
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
All of us are able to smell ants, for which the great word pismire was originally coined.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
At first he said he was a pismire, but the Speaker said pismire was not parliamentary, and he modified it to grasshopper.
From Punchinello, Volume 1, No. 08, May 21, 1870 by Various
—Call me not ugly thing; God' wisdom hath unto the pismire given, And spiders may teach men the way to Heaven.
From Works of John Bunyan — Volume 03 by Bunyan, John
A light dawned upon the intellect of that pismire.
From Cobwebs from an Empty Skull by Bierce, Ambrose
I never saw her again; that was fate, or...to never see the wanted is that phenomenal blindness; to never have the beauty is pismire.
From Voices from the Past by Bartlett, Paul Alexander
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
