Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definitions: Namby-pamby |
Namby-pambyAdjective1. Weak in willpower. Noun1. An insipid weakling who is foolishly sentimental. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "namby-pamby" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1856. (references) |
Synonyms: Namby-pambySynonyms: spineless (adj), wishy-washy (adj). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Affectation | Stiff, starch, formal, prim, smug, demure, tire a quatre epingles, quakerish, puritanical, prudish, pragmatical, priggish, conceited, coxcomical, foppish, dandified; finical, finikin; mincing, simpering, namby-pamby, sentimental. |
Unimportance | Trifling, trivial; slight, slender, light, flimsy, frothy, idle; puerile; (foolish); airy, shallow; weak; powerless; frivolous, petty, niggling; piddling, peddling; fribble, inane, ridiculous, farcical; finical, finikin; fiddle-faddle, fingle-fangle, namby-pamby, wishy-washy, milk and water. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
| "Namby-pamby" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Namby-pamby" is used about 9 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 100% | 9 | 117,287 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| Language | Translations for "namby-pamby"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | naze (coquetry, dalliance, fastidiousness, particularity, pickiness), sentimentalitet. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | сантиментален (corny, mushy, sappy, sentimental, soupy), глупави сантименталности, лигав (gooey, pituitary, slimy, slobbery, slushy), безхарактерен човек, безинтересен човек, банален (banal, commonplace, everyday, flatulent, hack, hackneyed, pedestrian, platitudinous, quotidian, tired, trite, trivial, twice-told, vapid, well worn, worn out), блудкав (insipid, mawkish, milk and water, sapless, unappetizing, washy), превзет (affected, cute, flamboyant, fussy, glossy, histrionic, lackadaisical, mannered, mincing, minikin, nice, niminy-piminy, old-maidish, pansy, precious, pretentious, pretty, pretty-pretty, priggish, prim, prissy, pseudo, recherche, schoolmistressy, sidy, snobbish, stuffy). (various references) | |
French | gnian-gnian, gnangnan. (various references) | |
German | verzärtelt (pampers), verweichlicht (effeminate, effeminately, mollycoddles, renders effeminate), unentschlossen (hesitant, iffy, indecisive, irresolute, irresolutely, seesawed, undecided, undecisive, undetermined, unresolved, unsettled, vacillating, waveringly), pimpelig (sissyish, soppy), muttersöhnchen, mutterkind. (various references) | |
Greek | σαχλόσ (mawkish, prosy, punk, silly, soppy, vapid), γλυκανάλατοσ, επιτετηδευμένοσ (affected, mincing), ανούσιοσ (flat, flavorless, flavourless, insipid, jejune, milk and water, savorless, tasteless, unpalatable, unsavory, unsavoury, vapid, zestless). (various references) | |
Hungarian | modoros (dandified, finicking, mannered, stilted), érzelgős írás, affektált (affected, finical, mincing, poncy, pretty-pretty, sophisticated, stiff), affektált ember, anyámasszony katonája (milksop, mollycoddle, molly-coddle, sissy boy), kényes (fastidious, finical, finicking, finicky, missy, pernickety, prickly, queasy, sensitive, subtle, tender, testy, ticklish), kényeskedő (missy, pernickety, priggish), édeskés (bland, fulsome, luscious, mawkish, silky, sugary, sweetish, treacly, unctuous), mesterkélt (affected, artful, artificial, compt, constrained, dandified, factitious, finicking, mannered, meretricious, mimic, precious, prim, sophisticated, stiff, theatrical, unconstrained), teddide-teddoda alak, modoros ember, negédes (mincing), nyám-nyám alak (milksop), pipogya ember, szentimentális (maudlin, sentimental, sickly, sloppy), szentimentális írás, szentimentális ember, kényeskedő ember. (various references) | |
Italian | smanceroso (mincing), sdolcinato (affected, gushing, mawkish, oversentimental, pretty-pretty, slobbery, sloppy, smooth, sugary). (various references) | |
Manx | thootagh (gauche, idiotic, lubberly, oafish, silly, tactless), thoot (boob, bumpkin, cry baby, idiot, lubber, oaf, simpleton), babbanit (indulged). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | amby-pambynay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | nudez (baldness, bareness, nude, nudity), pieguice (fussy), piegas (slobbery, slushy), levemente sentimental, denguice, dengoso (niminy-piminy), afetação (affectation, affectedness, airs, assumption, courtliness, coxcombry, frill, mannerist, pomposity, preciosity, pretence, pretense, pretension, primness). (various references) | |
Romanian | nehotãrât (at pause, doubtful, dubitative, hesitating, indecisive, indefinite, infirm of purpose, irresolute, pendent, pending, undecided, vague), slab (adynamic, angular, bad, cold, cranky, crazy, dicky, dim, Dotty, dull, faint, faintly, feckless, feeble, feebly, female, flabby, flaccid, flat, fleshless, flimsy, footless, forceless, frail, gaunt, groggy, helpless, impotent, inner, jaded, jejune, languid, languishing, languorous, lax, lean, Lenten, light, loose, low, meager, meagre, mean, mild, milk and water, nerveless, one horse, pale, peaked, penny-a-line, pimping, poor, poorly, powerless, quiet, remotely, rickety, scraggy, scrawny, shaky, sickly, silly, skinny, slack, slight, small, soft, sorry, spare, squeal, stringent, tender, thin, washy, weak, weakly), sentimental (lackadaisical, maudlin, sentimental, sentimentalist, sentimentally, slip-slop, soapy, soft, soulful, soulfully, tender-hearted), preţios (affected, bombastic, costly, dear, euphuistic, flatulent, golden, grandiose, mincing, niminy-piminy, ornate, precious, valuable, valued), lacrimogen (lachrymatory, tear-exciting), afectat (affected, affectedly, Arty, curious, demure, demurely, euphuistic, far fetched, finical, finicking, gushing, highfalutin, highfaluting, high-flown, lackadaisical, La-di-da, mannered, miminy-piminy, mincing, niminy-piminy, preciously, pretty, primly, recherche, scenic, self conscious, stilted, studied, swollen, theatrical). (various references) | |
Russian | сентиментальный (gooey, keepsake, maudlin, mawkish, novelettish, schmaltzy, sentimental, slobbery, sloshy, soppy, soulful, spoony), жеманство (affectation, primness). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | sentimentalnost (mush, sentimentality), sentimentalan (mushy, sentimental), bolećivost, bolećiv. (various references) | |
Spanish | soso (dull, flavorless, flavourless, halfbaked, insipid, savorless, savourless, tasteless, tastelessly, troubled, undistinctive, undynamic, washy, wishy washy), ñoño (characterless, fussy, senile, spineless). (various references) | |
Swedish | sentimental (gooey, maudlin, novelettish, sentimental, sloppy, slushy), mjäkig (mawkish). (various references) | |
Thai | อ่อนแอ (droop, effete, enfeebled, epicene, rickety, silly). (various references) | |
Turkish | yapmacıklı ve yavan, güzel ama yapmacıklı. (various references) | |
Ukranian | солодкуватий (sugary, sweetish), сентиментальщина (sentimentality), сентиментальний (gooey, maudlin, mushy, novelettish, sentimental, slobbery, sloshy, soulful, spoony), розмазня, тютя (gawky, nincompoop, ninny), манірність (affectation, affectedness, buckram, mannerism, nicety, offishness, primness), манірний (affected, angular, ceremonious, donnish, finical, lackadaisical, mannered, mincing, minikin, niminy-piminy, offish, prim, prudish, smug, starchy). (various references) | |
Vietnamese | nhạt nhẽo vô duyên; m u mè, người m u mè (la-di-da, poseur), văn đa sầu đa cảm người đa sầu, lời nói nhạt nhẽo vô duyên, câu chuyện nhạt nhẽo vô duyên người nhạt nhẽo vô duyên, điệu bộ văn uỷ mị, điệu bộ đa sầu, đa cảm (namby-pambiness, namby-pambyism, sentimental). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-b-b-m-m-n-p-y-y" | |
-4 letters: bayman. | |
-5 letters: abamp, mamba, mayan. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)4E 61 6D 62 79 2D 70 61 6D 62 79 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
|
Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01001110 01100001 01101101 01100010 01111001 00101101 01110000 01100001 01101101 01100010 01111001 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)N a m b y - p a m b y |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)004E 0061 006D 0062 0079 002D 0070 0061 006D 0062 0079 |
Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)4867796891158267796891 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Usage Frequency 4. Translations: Modern | 5. Anagrams 6. Orthography 7. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
