mimical

English

Etymology

From mimic + -al.

Pronunciation

  • (UK) IPA(key): /ˈmɪmɪk(ə)l/

Adjective

mimical (comparative more mimical, superlative most mimical)

  1. (obsolete) Pertaining to a mime, or jester.
  2. (now rare) Imitative; that mimics something else.
    • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: [], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 3, member 2:
      If he can [] talk big fustian, insult, scorn, strut, contemn others, and use a little mimical and apish complement above the rest, he is a complete (Egregiam vero laudem), a well-qualified gentleman []
    • 1640 (date written), H[enry] M[ore], “ΨΥΧΟΖΩΙΑ [Psychozōia], or A Christiano-platonicall Display of Life, []”, in ΨΥΧΩΔΙΑ [Psychōdia] Platonica: Or A Platonicall Song of the Soul, [], Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: [] Roger Daniel, printer to the Universitie, published 1642, →OCLC, book 2, stanza 47, page 26:
      [F]requent jot / Of his hard ſetting jade did ſo confound / The vvords that he by papyr-ſtealth had got, / That their loſt ſenſe the youngſter could not ſound, / Though he vvith mimical attention did abound.
      Jade here refers to “a horse too old to be put to work”.
    • 1651, Henry Wotton, A Philosophical Survey of Education:
      Man is, of all creatures, the most mimical.
  3. (obsolete) Imitation; mock.
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