Forms: 7 bagatell, baggatelle, bagatello, 7–8 bagatel, 8– bagatelle. [a. F. bagatelle, ad. It. bagatella, a dim. form which Diez attaches to Parmesan bagata a little property, prob. from baga: see BAGGAGE. With bagatello, cf. -ADO suff. 2. Formerly quite naturalized in sense 1, now scarcely so; sense 2 is purely Eng. in origin and use.]
1. A trifle, a thing of no value or importance.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett., II. xxi. Your trifles and bagatels are ill bestowed upon me.
1658. J. Robinson, Eudoxa, i. 4. Every particular thing … even unto the smallest bagatello’s.
1659. Gauden, Tears Ch., 102 (D.). To please themselves with toyes and bagatelloes.
1679. Mrs. Behn, Feign’d Curtizan, II. i. Ah Baggatelles, Seignior, Baggatelles.
a. 1733. North, Exam., II. v. ¶ 100. He makes a meer Bagatel of it.
1786. T. Jefferson, Writ., 1859, I. 566. As to the satisfaction for slaves carried off, it is a bagatelle.
1872. Baker, Nile Trib., iv. 53. The bonâ fide tax is a bagatelle to the amounts squeezed from him by the … soldiery.
b. A piece of verse or music in a light style.
1827. Gent. Mag., XCVII. II. 618. The best amatory and pastoral bagatelles in our language.
1880. Grove, Dict. Mus., Bagatelle, a short piece of pianoforte music in a light style.
† c. attrib. or as adj. Trifling, trumpery. Obs.
1637. Bastwick, Litany, I. 17. All which they haue … ouerthrowne with their baggatelle invention.
2. A game played on a table having a semicircular end at which are nine holes. The balls used are struck from the opposite end of the board with a cue. The name is sometimes applied to a modified form of billiards known also as semi-billiards.
1819. P. O. Lond. Direct., 343. Thurston, John … Billiard Table and Bagatelle Manufacturer.
1854. Mayhew, Lond. Labour, III. 298. They have cards and bagatelle to keep them.
b. attrib. as bagatelle-ball, -board, -room.
1837. Dickens, Pickw., xiv. A bagatelle-board on the first floor.
1854. Mayhew, Lond. Labour, II. 19. The numbered sockets in a bagatelle-board.
1863. H. Kingsley, A. Elliot, II. xvii. 235. Austin went on knocking the bagatelle-balls about.
