scintilla of regret
- noun
- /sɪnˈtɪlə əv rɪˈɡrɛt/
- Formal
:
una pizca de arrepentimiento
- There was not a scintilla of regret in her voice as she explained her decision.
Examples
-
Despite his mistakes, he had only a scintilla of regret for what he had done.
-
Probably not one iota, not even a scintilla, of regret?
-
She felt a scintilla of regret after choosing to leave the party early.
Antonyms
How Much Regret
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a very small amount of regret' is directly and transparently composed from 'scintilla' (a minute quantity) + 'of' + 'regret' with no idiomatic shift. The quantifier + of + noun pattern is common across languages and standard English, so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words would readily infer the MWE meaning.
Etymology
Scintilla of regret uses the word scintilla, which means a tiny 'spark', and regret means a feeling of being sorry; imagine just one little spark of feeling. That's why the phrase means 'a very small amount of regret'.