Puerile may call to mind qualities of youth and immaturity, but the term itself is no spring chicken. On the contrary, it's been around for more than three centuries, and its predecessors in French and Latin, the adjectives puéril and puerilis, respectively, are far older. Those two terms have the same basic meaning as the English word puerile, and they both trace to the Latin noun puer, meaning "boy" or "child." Nowadays, puerile can describe the acts or utterances of an actual child, but it more often refers (usually with marked disapproval) to occurrences of childishness where adult maturity would be expected or preferred.
told the teenagers that such puerile behavior would not be tolerated during the ceremony
allowed the company to be taken over by a bunch of puerile whippersnappers fresh out of business school
Recent Examples on the WebTrump’s supporters turn the tables on his puerile critics.—Ryan Fonseca, Los Angeles Times, 15 May 2024 The whole matter is puerile, and Sheriff Gahler should accept he’s met his match in Cassilly.—Aegis Reader Commentary, Baltimore Sun, 29 Mar. 2024 The reflexive response to the sight of André Onana standing, yet again, with his head bowed and his shoulders slumped after Manchester United’s gloriously puerile draw with Galatasaray on Wednesday is sympathy.—Rory Smith, New York Times, 1 Dec. 2023 Trump is, always and forever, a puerile bully, stuck perpetually on the fifth-grade playground.—Susan B. Glasser, The New Yorker, 14 Mar. 2024 The inexplicable twists are interspersed with puerile action scenes.—Kyle Chayka, The New Yorker, 13 Feb. 2024 Hoping to usurp him from the throne, Kuzco's advisor, Yzma (Eartha Kitt), cooks up a plot to poison the puerile figurehead.—Devin Nealy, EW.com, 16 Oct. 2023 As legal weed proliferates across the country, many storefronts have adopted a sterile, corporate aesthetic, while others lean into puerile graphics of, say, red-eyed Rick and Morty smoking blunts.—Ezra Marcus, New York Times, 30 Jan. 2024 Pop music, pointless and puerile, was beneath his contempt.—Joel Selvin, Smithsonian Magazine, 7 Nov. 2023
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'puerile.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Etymology
French or Latin; French puéril, from Latin puerilis, from puer boy, child; akin to Sanskrit putra son, child and perhaps to Greek pais boy, child — more at few
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