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  1. scintilla love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A minute amount; an iota or trace.
  2. n. A spark; a flash.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A spark; a glimmer; hence, the least particle; a trace; a tittle.
  2. n. [capitalized] [NL.] In zoology:
  3. n. A genus of bivalve mollusks.
  4. n. A genus of lepidopterous insects.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A small spark or flash.
  2. n. A small or trace amount.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A spark; the least particle; an iota; a tittle.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a tiny or scarcely detectable amount
  2. n. a sparkling glittering particle

Etymologies

  1. Existing in English since the seventeenth century; from Latin scintilla ("sparkling speck, atom"). (Wiktionary)
  2. Latin, spark. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

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Lists

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Comments

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  • kingparton A hundred races, from the mightiest to the weakest... you took from each of them a shade, a hue, a tint, and a scintilla, enfolding them to your bosom, adding them to the splendor of your attire, and continuing your course through the ages with vigor and resolve.

    Arshak Chopanian, "Ode to My Native Tongue" Jul 25, 2011

  • thenewvivek Sounds like a fragment of a fascinating conversation. Aug 26, 2009

  • asativum You know, I'd think a scintilla is smaller than a soupçon, just from the phrase"not a scintilla of evidence. Jun 21, 2008

  • gangerh But smaller than a soupspoon. Jun 21, 2008

  • johnmperry I always envisage a scintilla as being hard and sharp, like a glass splinter, whereas a soupcon sounds much more liquid somehow. Jun 21, 2008

  • johnmperry Probably bigger than a soupcon
    Jun 21, 2008

  • bilby Italian - spark. Apr 7, 2008

  • reesetee Also the name of an imaginary ultra-compact car. ;-> Oct 8, 2007

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‘scintilla’ has been looked up 3900 times, loved by 23 people, added to 114 lists, commented on 9 times, and has a Scrabble score of 11.