Word meaning to judge something as having little or no worth
I'm almost certain there's an English word, possibly archaic, for judging something (or someone) as having negligible worth. It might be a verb, or perhaps an adjective describing someone who does this. As I vaguely recall, it has four or more syllables. Please could someone enlighten me.
Solution 1:
To floccinaucinihilipilificate means exactly that. It is a concaténation of the following: Latin words:
- floccum means a straw. flocci is its genitive, and in this context is a genitive of value and so means ‘worth a straw’ and so ‘worthless’.
- N’aucun means a nutshell and so nauci means worth a nutshell.
- Similarly ‘nihil’ means ‘nothing’ and so nihili means worth nothing;
- ‘Pili’ means worth a hair.
‘-fication’ is Latinate ending as in ‘modification’. So it means exactly what you need.
The word was used in the 18th century by William Shenstone.
Solution 2:
A verb with four syllables is trivialize:
[Merriam-Webster]
: to make trivial : reduce to triviality
// The news story trivialized the problem.
// He is trivializing the situation.trivial
1 a : of little worth or importance
// a trivial objection
// trivial problems
So, when you trivialize something, you judge it as, or make it to be as, having little worth or importance.
A related four-syllable word, which applies in a more specific sense, is marginalize:
[Merriam-Webster]
: to relegate (see RELEGATE sense 2) to an unimportant or powerless position within a society or group
We are protesting policies that marginalize women.
Barring context that isn't in the question itself, trivialize is the more general term, and it will apply to a wider range of situations. But marginalize can be more appropriate in the right context—if you're talking about trivializing something in the additional sense of making them actively unworthy of notice or effect.