Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A small gift presented by a storeowner to a customer with the customer's purchase.
- noun An extra or unexpected gift or benefit.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun In Louisiana, a trifling present given to customers by tradesmen; a gratuity.
- noun A tip or gratuity.
- noun Anything obtained gratuitously or unexpectedly.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Louisiana, Trinidad and Tobago An
extra orunexpected gift orbenefit , such as that given to a customer when they purchase something else.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a small gift (especially one given by a merchant to a customer who makes a purchase)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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NEW ORLEANS — In these parts, they refer to it as lagniappe, a Cajun word that roughly translated means “a little bit extra.”
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"What we call a lagniappe, a little somethin 'extra.
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It is the unearnable gift, the divine reversal and sacred surprise, the still small voice that drowns out the din of the maddening crowd, the little bit extra that my Cajun friends call lagniappe, the very thing we "deserve" the least but get anyway.
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It is the unearnable gift, the divine reversal and sacred surprise, the still small voice that drowns out the din of the maddening crowd, the little bit extra that my Cajun friends call lagniappe, the very thing we "deserve" the least but get anyway.
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It is the unearnable gift, the divine reversal and sacred surprise, the still small voice that drowns out the din of the maddening crowd, the little bit extra that my Cajun friends call lagniappe, the very thing we "deserve" the least but get anyway.
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It is the unearnable gift, the divine reversal and sacred surprise, the still small voice that drowns out the din of the maddening crowd, the little bit extra that my Cajun friends call lagniappe, the very thing we "deserve" the least but get anyway.
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Baksheesh or whatever they call it; every language has its own word from "lagniappe" to "pishkesh" to "mordida" "h'eung yau" is - am I stereotyping yet or will a scholar back me up?
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Just to entertain you, I'll pass on that JR, at L'homme qui marche, seeing "lagniappe" in your last entry, decided to look it up.
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Waller's music, as "lagniappe," while cold chills raced up and down the spines of his hearers -- more or less immune to sensations of that character.
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Tellem "JOE PARIS" sent you and receive some "lagniappe" with your meal!
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angharad commented on the word lagniappe
Somewhere between the "baker's dozen" and a bribe.
December 4, 2006
john commented on the word lagniappe
"Call it a little lagniappe, goodbuddy, that’s Duane Marvy’s way o’ doin’ thangs."
- Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow, 1973
December 7, 2006
niels commented on the word lagniappe
Wikipedia cites Mark Twain pronouncing it lanny-yap, but in present day New Orleans it's pronounced LAN-yap, like your local area network is a LAN, and small dogs yap. LAN-yap.
March 14, 2007
chained_bear commented on the word lagniappe
Wow! This is derived from a Quechua term!
October 29, 2007
reesetee commented on the word lagniappe
Really? Who'd have guessed....
October 29, 2007
rolig commented on the word lagniappe
"We picked up one excellent word – a word worth travelling to New Orleans to get; a nice, limber, expressive, handy word – 'lagniappe.' They pronounce it lanny-yap. It is Spanish – so they said."
– Mark Twain, "Life on the Mississippi"
(courtesy The Online Etymological Dictionary)
February 3, 2009
apgarian commented on the word lagniappe
like swag, right?
September 6, 2009