punctilio

Italian puntiglio, or Spanish puntillo, diminutive from Latin punctum (“point”).

• IPA^(key): /pʌŋkˈtɪliˌoʊ/

punctilio (countable and uncountable, plural punctilios)

1. A fine point in exactness of conduct, ceremony or procedure. Strictness in observance of formalities.
   • 1830, Joseph Plumb Martin, A Narrative of Some of the Adventures, Dangers and Sufferings of a Revolutionary Soldier, Ch. IX:

     The country was rigorous in exacting my compliance to my engagements to a punctilio, but equally careless in performing her contracts with me; and why so?

   • 1884, Henry James, "The Path of Duty" in The English Illustrated Magazine 2(15): 240–256.

     [I]t seemed strange to be engaged to so charming a girl and yet go through with it as if it were simply a social duty. If one had n't been in love with her at first, one ought to have been at the end of a week or two. If Ambrose Tester was not (and to me he did n't pretend to be), he carried it off, as I have said, better than I should have expected. He was a gentleman, and he behaved like a gentleman, with the added punctilio, I think, of being sorry for his betrothed.

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, “[[Episode 16]]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare & Co.; Sylvia Beach, OCLC 560090630; republished London: Published for the Egoist Press, London by John Rodker, Paris, October 1922, OCLC 2297483:

     All those wretched quarrels, in his humble opinion, stirring up bad blood, from some bump of combativeness or gland of some kind, erroneously supposed to be about a punctilio of honour and a flag, […]

   • 1988, Alan Hollinghurst, The Swimming Pool Library, Penguin Books (1988), page 254

     Covert gestures of kindness saved me from trouble, or explained the punctilio of some futile but unavoidable chore.

• punctiliar
• punctilious

• ponticuli, unpolitic