picayune vs privative

picayune

adj
  • Of little consequence; small and of little importance; petty, trivial. 

  • Childishly spiteful; tending to go on about unimportant things; small-minded. 

noun
  • A person regarded as unworthy of respect or useless; also, something of very little value; a trifle. 

  • An argument, fact, or other issue raised (often intentionally) that distracts from a larger issue or fails to make any difference. 

  • A small coin of the value of six-and-a-quarter cents; a Spanish coin with a value of half a real; a fippenny bit. 

privative

adj
  • consisting in the absence of something; negative 

  • causing privation; depriving 

  • indicating the absence of something 

noun
  • something that causes privation or indicates an absence 

How often have the words picayune and privative occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )