nubbin

1 a very small piece had only a nubbin of crayon left Synonyms atom, crumb, dribble, fleck, flyspeck, grain, granule, molecule, morsel, mote, bit, nugget, particle, patch, scrap, scruple, snip, snippet, speck, tittleRelated Words ace, dab, dash, driblet, drop, fraction, haet [chiefly Scottish], halfpenny, ha'penny, iota, jot, kenning [chiefly Scottish], lick, minim, mite, modicum, nutshell, ounce, pinch, shred, smatter, smidgen (also smidgeon or smidgin or smidge), spot, strain, streak, suspicion, taste, touch, trace, whisper, whit; bite, mouthful, nibble, tidbit (also titbit); fragment, part, portion, section; chip, flake, shard, shiver, sliver, splinter; clipping, paring, shaving; smithereensNear Antonyms chunk, gob, hunk, lump, slab; abundance, barrel, bucket, bushel, deal, heaps, loads, mass, mountain, peck, pile, pot, profusion, quantity, raft, scads, stack, volume, wad, wealth

2 the central part or aspect of something under consideration this nubbin of the intelligence report is the prediction that the country's government will soon fall Synonyms bottom line, bull's-eye, centerpiece, core, essence, gist, heart, kernel, keynote, meat, meat and potatoes, net, nub, crux, nucleus, pith, pivot, point, root, sumRelated Words course, direction, drift, tenor; body, content, substance; hypothesis, proposition, purport, subject, theme, thesis