subs. (old colloquial).—A trifle; a matter of little worth or consequence. As adj. = trumpery, trifling. [O.E.D.: ‘Formerly quite naturalised; now scarcely so.’]

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  1637.  J. BASTWICK, The Litany, i. 17. All which they haue … overthrowne with their BAGATELLE invention.

2

  c. 1645.  HOWELL, Familiar Letters, II. xxi. Your trifles and BAGATELLS are ill bestowed upon me, therfore heerafter I pray let me have of your best. Ibid. I rummag’d all my stores, and search’d my cells, Wher nought appear’d, God wot, but BAGATELLS.

3

  1658.  J. ROBINSON, Eudoxa, i. 4. Every particular thing … even unto the smallest BAGATELLO’S.

4

  1659.  GAUDEN, The Tears of the Church, 102. To please themselves with toyes and BAGATELLOES.

5

  1679.  BEHN, The Feign’d Curtezans, ii. 1. Ah BAGGATELLES, Seignior, BAGGATELLES.

6

  c. 1733.  R. NORTH, Examen, II. v. 100. He makes a mere BAGATEL of it.

7

  1786.  JEFFERSON, Writings (1859), I. 566. As to the satisfaction for slaves carried off, it is a BAGATELLE.

8

  1872.  SIR S. W. BAKER, The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia, iv. 53. The bonâ fide tax is a BAGATELLE to the amounts squeezed from him by the extortionate soldiery.

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