Definitions

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

  • adjective Of little or no importance; trifling.
  • adjective Unavailing, futile, or invalid.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Trifling; futile; worthless: without significance.
  • Of no force or effect; inoperative; ineffectual; vain.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Trifling; vain; futile; insignificant.
  • adjective Of no force; inoperative; ineffectual.

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

  • adjective Trivial, trifling or of little importance.
  • adjective Ineffective, invalid or futile.
  • adjective law Having no force, inoperative, ineffectual.
  • adjective computing Removable from a computer program with safety, but harmless if retained.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective of no real value

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin nūgātōrius, from nūgātor, trifler, from nūgārī, to trifle, from nūgae, jokes.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin nugatorius.

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Examples

  • As TV and the Internet converge into something generically known as broadband, the distinctions between the two will soon become nugatory from a consumer point of view.

    The Revolution Will Be Televised 2008

  • As TV and the Internet converge into something generically known as broadband, the distinctions between the two will soon become nugatory from a consumer point of view.

    The Revolution Will Be Televised 2008

  • As soon as the lords were out of Henry's reach, the Scots Estates demanded modifications in the proposed treaty which would have made it nugatory from the English point of view.

    England under the Tudors

  • Yesterday's term was nugatory, which is defined as:

    Define That Term #45 2006

  • Yesterday's term was nugatory, which is defined as:

    Sui Generis--a New York law blog: 2006

  • In my opinion, people who opine about the "merely aesthetic," who find aesthetic values "nugatory" unless they are subservient to a higher principle of judgment, manifestly disdain art except as an illustrative aid, a utilitarian convenience.

    Art and Culture 2010

  • The "aesthetic canons of legitimacy and achievement," which Helen Vendler observes and attempts to advance, are "nugatory" unless they buttress these cultural pillars.

    Politics and Literature 2007

  • I spent yesterday writing the icky sequences of the WIP and the end is in sight for it and I decided that my celebration would be to keep 'nugatory' alive in my vocabulary.

    Even in a little thing gillpolack 2005

  • Sorry, I just had to get 'nugatory' into a sentence.

    Even in a little thing gillpolack 2005

  • In this telling, tactical excellence and the considerable courage of frontline troops are forever being rendered nugatory by failed leadership.

    Bing West's "The Wrong War," on Afghanistan strategy 2011

Comments

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  • What spark of humanity, of a possible creativity, can remain alive in a being dragged out of sleep at six every morning, jolted about in suburban trains, deafened by the racket of machinery, bleached and steamed by meaningless sounds and gestures, spun dry by statistical controls, and tossed out at the end of the day into the entrance halls of railway stations, those cathedrals of departure for the hell of weekdays and the nugatory paradise of weekends, where the crowd communes in weariness and boredom?

    The Revolution of Everyday Life

    by Raoul Vaneigem

    June 17, 2008

  • Hi Darq. Putting square brackets around nugatory helps to make it stand out in the citation. Which is excellent, by the way.

    June 17, 2008

  • "the nugatory paradise of weekends"! I love it! Excellent citation, Darqueau!

    June 17, 2008

  • The best citations make me immediately want to read the text.

    June 17, 2008

  • Not as Delicious as they Sound

    May 14, 2009

  • "The plan of the convention declares that the power of Congress, or, in other words, of the NATIONAL LEGISLATURE, shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd, as well as useless, if a general authority was intended.

    In like manner the judicial authority of the federal judicatures is declared by the Constitution to comprehend certain cases particularly specified. The expression of those cases marks the precise limits, beyond which the federal courts cannot extend their jurisdiction, because the objects of their cognizance being enumerated, the specification would be nugatory if it did not exclude all ideas of more extensive authority."

    -Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers #83

    March 19, 2010