particularity

noun

Etymology: From Middle French particularité (“part of a whole; something particular, particularity”) (modern French particularité), and from its etymon Late Latin particularitas (“fact or quality of being particular; something particular, particularity”), from Latin particulāris (“particular; partial”) + -tās (suffix forming feminine abstract nouns indicating a state of being). Particulāris is derived from particula (“particle, small part”) (from pars (“a part, piece, portion, share”) (probably ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *perh₃- (“to provide, produce, beget”)) + -cula (diminutive suffix)) + -āris (suffix denoting a relationship, forming adjectives). The English word is analysable as particular + -ity (suffix forming nouns from adjectives, referring to the properties, qualities, or states of what is denoted by the adjectives).

1. A particular thing.

   “In this particularity vvhereof vve novv ſpeake, ſee hovv his Mercy and Truth are met together, and doe moſt lovingly embrace each other.”

   “[I]f they never hear plain truth from men, they see the best of every thing, in every kind, and they see things so grouped and amassed as to infer easily the sum and genius, instead of tedious particularities.”

2. A distinctive characteristic or quality; a peculiarity.

   “Donny’s obsession for trains is just a harmless particularity of his.”

3. A particular case or matter.

   “Novv let the generall Trumpet blovv his blaſt, / Particularities, and pettie ſounds / To ceaſe.”

   “[W]e Chriſtians, vnto vvhom it is reuealed in particularity, that all Men came from one Lumpe of Earth; […]”

4. The condition of being particular rather than general or universal; specificity.

   “But true Religion sprung from God above / Is like her fountain full of charity, / […] / [F]ree, large, even infinite, / Not wedg'd in strait particularity, / But grasping all in her vast active spright, / Bright lamp of God! that men would joy in thy pure light!”

   “An indefinite Propoſition, is, vvhen no Note, either of Univerſality or Particularity, is prefixed to a Subject, vvhich is in its ovvn Nature general; as, a Planet is ever changing its Place: Angels are noble Creatures.”

5. The condition of being particular rather than general or universal; specificity.
6. The condition of being particular rather than general or universal; specificity.
7. Attention to detail; fastidiousness.

   “There is no part of the Goſpel vvrit vvith ſo copious a Particularity, as the Hiſtory of his [Jesus's] Sufferings and Death; as there vvas indeed no part of the Goſpel ſo important as this is.”

   “Sir Rovvland himſelf, as you vvill gueſs by his particularity, is an old bachelor, and one vvho vvants to have a vvoman made on purpoſe for his nephevv; and vvho poſitively inſiſts upon qualities, before he knovvs her, not one of vvhich, perhaps, his future niece vvill have.”

8. The condition of being special; peculiarity, specialness.

   “To pass my evenings in so sweet a conversation, and have the esteem of a woman of your merit, has in it a particularity of happiness no more to be expressed than returned.”

9. The condition of being special in an unexpected way; oddness, strangeness; (countable) an instance of this.

   “No man ought to be tolerated in a habitual humour, whim, or particularity of behaviour, by any who do not wait upon him for bread.”

   “Lucy looks at her uncle as if ſhe could hardly excuſe his particularities; but Mrs. Shirley has alvvays ſomething to ſay for him.”

10. The paying of particular close attention to someone; (countable) an instance of this.

    “Whenever they met, they talked to each other aloud, chose each other partner at balls, saluted at the most conspicuous parts of the service of the church, and practised, in honour of each other, all the remarkable particularities which are usual for persons who admire one another, and are contemptible to the rest of the world.”

    “While I, to blind the world to our engagement, was behaving one hour with objectionable particularity to another woman, was she to be consenting the next to a proposal which might have made every previous caution useless?”