Puerile
Pronunciation
- RP IPA: /ˈpjʊə.raɪl/
- US IPA: /ˈpjʊrɪl/, /ˈpjʊraɪl/
Origin
From Latin puerīlis ("childish"), from puer ("child, boy").
Full definition of puerile
Adjective
puerile
- Characteristic of, or pertaining to, a boy or boys; confer: puellile.
- Childish; trifling; silly.
- unknown date De Quincey:The French have been notorious through generations for their puerile affectation of Roman forms, models, and historic precedents.
- 1927, Thornton Wilder, , page 79:From the table he had received the gout; from the alcove a tendency to convulsions; from the grandeeship a pride so vast and puerile that he seldom heard anything that was said to him and talked to the ceiling in a perpetual monologue; from the exile, oceans of boredom, a boredom so persuasive that it was like pain,—he woke up with it and spent the day with it, and it sat by his bed all night watching his sleep.