Word of the day

I came across a splendid new word in reference 1 this morning: 'vétille', in the context of Maigret apologizing for troubling an important man at his home with a bit of nonsense, something that was probably nothing. The sort of important man who would not, in real life, take tea with either Mr. or Mrs. Simenon. For which see reference 2.

Turning to Larousse, we have, in addition vétiller, vétilleux and vétillieuse. To amuse oneself with trifles, a gentleman who does a lot of this and a lady who does a lot of this respectively.

To which Littré adds vétillard and vétillarde, more people who spend quality time with trifles. Adds the sense of pedant to vétilleux, adds adjectival uses to vétilleux, for example, as in a pettifogging task.

All this from the Spanish diminutive for a ribbon, that is to say vetilla from veta. With Littré not being confirmed on this point by Linguee (snapped above), which talks of the noun being a vein, a streak, grain (of wood or stone) and of the verb being our veto. With Portuguese not allowing the adjective at all. Perhaps I need to consult a proper Spanish dictionary.

I also learn that the approved designation in Littré for all these silent double ells is 'll mouillées'. With mouillées, literally dampened, being a word used by Simenon to describe a criminal who get his hands dirty, particularly with violence against persons, or more often the sort of criminal who takes care to leave that sort of thing to others. I seem to recall from James Bond books that Russian spies talked of wet affairs in the same sort of sense. With the dreaded Smersh being empowered to conduct wet affairs. As indeed was James.

Reference 1: Maigret hésite - Simenon - 1968. Being the first of two stories in Volume XXVI of the collected works.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/04/toffs-old-and-new.html.