WORD FOR THE DAY: MIM

Your word for today is: mim, adj. and adv.

mim, adj. and adv.

[‘ Reserved or restrained in manner or behaviour, esp. in a contrived or priggish way; affectedly modest, demure; primly silent, quiet; affectedly moderate or abstemious in diet (rare). Also (occas.) of a person's appearance.’]

Pronunciation: Brit. /mɪm/,  U.S. /mɪm/

Forms:  pre-17 17– mim,   19– mimm. 

Etymology:Origin uncertain. Perhaps imitative of the action of pursing up the mouth. Compare mimp n. and adj., mum n.¹, int., and adj.

C. McKay Dict. Lowland Scotch (1888) posits instead Scottish Gaelic mìn delicate, meek ( <  Early Irish mín soft: see the note s.v.minion n.¹) as a possible origin.

 orig. and chiefly Sc. and Brit regional.

 A. adj.

  Reserved or restrained in manner or behaviour, esp. in a contrived or priggish way; affectedly modest, demure; primly silent, quiet; affectedly moderate or abstemious in diet (rare). Also (occas.) of a person's appearance.

a1586 Dumb Wyfe 91 in  W. A. Craigie Maitland Folio MS (1919) I, The mimest wyff that euer tuik lyff Will ware sum wordis and start hir.

a1687  R. McWard Επαγωνισμοι (1723) 323 The best of our Synods (for as mim as we have made it to this Day) are justly chargeable with the Blood of that renowned Martyr [sc. Guthrie].

1718  A. Ramsay Christ's-kirk on Green ii. 16 She was..mim that Day.

1737  A. Ramsay Coll Scots Prov. 9 A bit but, and a bit ben, Makes a mim maiden at the board end.

1768  A. Ross Helenore (1789) 106 Now Nory all the while was playing prim, As ony lamb as modest, and as mim; And never a look with Lindy did lat fa'.

1777 Fergusson's Sc. Prov. in Select Coll. Sc. Poems 24 Maidens should be mim till they're married, and then they may burn kirks.

1816  Scott Black Dwarf ii, in Tales of my Landlord 1st Ser. I. 49 Did I not say it was nae want o' spunk that made ye [sc. the young Laird] sae mim?

a1825  R. Forby Vocab. E. Anglia (1830), Mim, primly silent, with lips closed lest a stray word should escape.

1880  L. Parr Adam & Eve xiii, Worth twenty o' that stuck-up London consarn, with her pasty face and mim ways.

1891  R. T. Cooke Huckleberries 96 She was a mim, soft-spoken woman, but guileful and gliding as a snake.

1927  J. Buchan Witch Wood xiv. 231 And she went on wi' her saft een and her mim mou'.

1960  W. H. Auden Homage to Clio 56 Before you catch it for your mim look and gnostic chirrup.

1991  A. Blair More Tea at Miss Cranston's xiii. 150 You got to taste the shortbread or blackbun and the ginger wine... Crabbe's [i.e. Crabbie's]... no' very nice really, but you sat there mim as a pussy cat and sipped it.

 B. adv.

  Esp. of speech: primly, affectedly. Now rare.

1786  R. Burns Holy Fair xvi, in Poems 48 See, up he's got the word o' G—, An' meek an' mim has view'd it.

1894  S. R. Crockett Raiders xxxvi. 306 Jen..had a pin in her mouth. ‘What for are ye speakin' sae mim?’

1907  N. Munro Daft Days xv. 134 Speaking mim as if you had a clothes-pin in your mouth.

Compounds

 C1.

 mim-looking adj.

1849  C Brontë Shirley I. viii. 182 Some o' t' bonniest and mimest looking too.

 mim-spoken adj.

1896  ‘L. Keith’ Indian Uncle xi. 189 Douce, plod-plodding, mim-spoken lads.

 C2.

 mim-mouthed adj. silent, reserved, reticent, esp. affectedly so; prim, meek, or effete in speech or (in extended use) behaviour.

1721  A. Ramsay Lucky Spence iii, O Black-ey'd Bess, and mim mou'd Meg, O'er good to work or yet to beg.

1820 Smugglers I. xiii. 164 I'm no for being mim mou'd when there's no reason; but a man had as gude, whiles, cast a knot on his tongue.

1914 County Folk-lore VII. 391 Mim-mou'ed maidens never get a man; muckle-mou'ed maids get twa.

1997 Scotl. on Sunday (Electronic ed.) 20 Apr., His work with Aberdeen was even more astonishing. He took a mim-mouthed club, and made them predators feared throughout Europe.

 mim-mouthedness n. primness, reserve, affectation.

1875  G. MacDonald Malcolm I. p. viii, Some of the rougher women despised the sweet outlandish speech she had brought with her from her native England, and accused her of mim-mou'dness.

1889 Sat. Rev. 12 Jan. 37/1 That ‘mimmouthedness’ which has become a fashion of late.

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