Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The bite of a flea.
  • noun The small red mark caused by a flea's bite.
  • noun A trifling loss, inconvenience, or annoyance.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The bite of a flea, or the mark caused by such a bite.
  • noun Something which causes only trifling irritation; a minor inconvenience.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From flea +‎ bite.

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Examples

  • I am not interested in your provincial attempts to diminish and enclose the question to a fleabite.

    Whose Hand Have You Refused to Shake? 2007

  • About how terrific everything smelled this minute, and how great that scratch behind the ear felt on a fleabite.

    Night World No. 1 L.J. Smith 1996

  • About how terrific everything smelled this minute, and how great that scratch behind the ear felt on a fleabite.

    Night World No. 1 L.J. Smith 1996

  • And I tried to make her feel a fleabite on her ankle.

    Lord of Chaos Jordan, Robert, 1948- 1994

  • And then, still in a reasonable voice, "I've never found it necessary, Dr. Quental, to seek medical aid for a fleabite."

    River Of Desire Taylor, Abra 1982

  • His most towering rage, controlled only by supreme expenditures of effort, was met with no more reaction than the bite of a flea; less, for a fleabite is at least scratched.

    The Clan of the Cave Bear Auel, Jean M. 1980

  • It was a fleabite to them apparently, but it was the hell of a lot of money to me.

    ROUND THE BEND Shute, Nevil, 1899-1960 1951

  • I had paid six hundred pounds for one and four hundred and fifty for the other; they were a fleabite in the total value of my aeroplanes, and both of them were pretty well written down in the accounts.

    ROUND THE BEND Shute, Nevil, 1899-1960 1951

  • The water problem is still unsolved, and we get very thirsty; but thirst is a small fleabite, after all.

    Letters to Helen Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front Keith Henderson 1932

  • It is eighty miles third-class and more; it is thirty or less first-class; it is a flash in a train _de luxe, _ and a mere fleabite as a bribe to a journalist.

    The Path to Rome Hilaire Belloc 1911

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