non-personn.
/nɒnˈpəːsn/, U.S. /nɑnˈpərs(ə)n/ 1. Christian Church and Judaism. A being which is not a person; esp. God. rare.
ΚΠ
1886 K. Pearson tr. M. Eckehart in Mind 11 29 Thou shalt love him as he is, a non-god, a non-spirit, a non-person [Middle High German nihtpersōne], a non-form; more, as he is an absolute pure clear one.
1948 M. Buber Hasidism ii. 97 God..is both person and non-person.
2. A person who is regarded as non-existent or unimportant, or who is not considered as a person for purposes of entitlement to rights, etc.; an ignored, humiliated, or forgotten person. Cf. non-people n.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > attention and judgement > importance > unimportance > [noun] > one who is unimportant
unknownc1390
pawnc1450
semi-cipher?1550
bauble1570
Jack with the feather1581
nobody1583
winterling1585
squash1600
rush candle1628
niflec1635
nullity1657
nonentity1710
featherweight1812
underscrub1822
nyaff1825
small fish1836
no-account1840
little fish1846
peanut1864
commonplacer1874
sparrow-fart1886
Little Willie1901
pipsqueak1905
nebbish1907
pie-biter1911
blob1916
smallie1930
no-count1932
zilch1933
Mickey Mouse1935
muzhik1945
nerd1951
nothingburger1953
nerk1955
non-person1959
no-mark1982
1959 Times Lit. Suppl. 2 Oct. 555/3 The belief that all Africans, students and dockers alike, are the same; the notion that they are ‘non-persons’, with a kind of animal anonymity which relieves whites of their inhibitions.
1973 R. Hayes Hungarian Game xxiii. 145 Neither AVH nor KGB had a watch on Mityas' house. He'd become such a non-person that not even they worried about whom he saw.
1996 D. Davie Poems 41 My son the poet who is having a great success; On whose account you interview this non-person.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1886