nonpareil

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“
An 'Only' is a nonpareil, the feller that does one kind of a turn better'n any other feller.

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Definitions (17)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. adjective Having no equal; peerless: the Yankees' nonpareil center fielder.
  2. noun A person or thing that has no equal; a paragon.
  3. noun See painted bunting.
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Examples (50)

  • We also have some fascinating thinkers and poets nonpareil: Marshall McLuhan, occasionally bumbling, Canada doesn't have any national diseases (SARS was overblown) needing Sarkozy-strength fixing. —  Traffick
  • You may also know him as a remixer nonpareil, rejigging everyone from —  I Like Music - music news
  • Perhaps that helps explain the valiant tennis when she was down all those set points, and the way her nerve - and legs and lungs - held up under the strain added four more footnotes to her bibliography as a nonpareil competitor. —  Peter Bodo's TennisWorld
  • And that most deeply to consider is The beauty of his daughter; he himself 95 Calls her a nonpareil: I never saw a woman, But only Sycorax my dam and she; But she as far surpasseth Sycorax As great’st does least Ste. Is it so brave a lass Cal. —  The Tempest The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.]
  • Apples: Golden pippin, nonpareil, winter pearmain, golden russet. —  Enquire Within Upon Everything The Great Victorian Domestic Standby
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

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Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English nounparalle, from Old French nonpareil : non-, non- + pareil, equal (from Vulgar Latin *pariculus, diminutive of Latin pār, equal; see perə-2 in Indo-European roots).

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. Formerly also nonpairell; = Spanish nomparel, n.; from French nonpareil, nompareil, not equal (feminine nonpareille, a kind of type, ribbon, pear, etc.), from non, not (see non), + pareil, equal: see pareil.
 

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/nɑnpæˈrɛl/
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