- circumstantial
- circumstantial, minute, particular, particularized, detailed, itemized are comparable when they mean dealing with a matter point by point.Circumstantial applies especially to accounts of events or to narratives, but it is applicable also to the persons who recount or narrate or to their memories. The term implies full and precise reference to the incidents or circumstances attending an event{
a circumstantial account of the battle has not yet been written
}{generally speaking, a historical novel . . . must be documented with the news of what once happened, and full of circumstantial life— Garrigue
}{my memory is exact and circumstantial— Dickens
}Minute, in addition, applies to investigations, researches, inspections, and descriptions; it stresses interest in or inclusion of every detail, no matter how trivial or insignificant. It therefore usually connotes exhaustiveness or meticulous exactness{he prolonged the flower-picking process by minute and critical choice— Deland
}{Plato ... in the Laws . . . provides for the state a perfect jungle of minute regulations— Buchan
}{she was interested in the little details and writes with minute care about the change of fashion— Bradford
}Particular differs little from circumstantial except in being applicable also to descriptions and lists; it may therefore imply attention to every feature or item rather than to every incident or circumstance{a particular description of every musical instrument in the collection
}{it is as particular as the four-sheet maps from which it is taken— Jefferson
}{I think myself obliged to be very particular in this relation, lest my veracity should be suspected— Swift
}Particularized often replaces particular as applied to narratives, descriptions, and lists; it is not used of those who so narrate, describe, or list, but it may be applied to the circumstances, features, and items that they present{Scott's particularized descriptions of his characters
}{a most concrete, particularized, earthy series of small diurnal recognitions— Powys
}Detailed applies to a circumstantial or minute account, description, study, or representation; it implies, however, abundance of rather than exhaustiveness in detail{Perera in the sixteenth century . . . presents a detailed picture of Chinese life— Ellis
}{the detailed study of history should be supplemented by brilliant outlines— Russell
}Itemized implies complete enumeration of details, especially of those that indicate the separate purchases or separate credits in a mercantile account, or of those that indicate the articles or groups of articles in the possession of a person or business (as in an inventory){an itemized bill
}{itemized list of his expenditures
}The term is also applicable to descriptions, narratives, or accounts which in addition to being particularized have something of the formality of an inventory{an itemized description of a room
}Antonyms: abridged: summary
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
