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American Dictionary of the English Language

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Menial


ME'NIAL, adjective

1. Pertaining to servants or domestic servants; low; mean.

The women attendants perform only the most menial offices.

[Johnson observes on this passage, that Swift seems not to have known the meaning of this word. But this is the only sense in which it is now used.]

2. Belonging to the retinue or train of servants.

Two menial dogs before their master pressed.

[If this definition of Johnson is correct, it indicates that menial is from meinez, many, rather than from mesnie, family. But the sense may be house-dogs.]