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March 14th
1369 - Henry of Trastamare defeated Pedro I of Castile at the battle of Montiel in the Castilian Civil War. Pedro was executed nine days later. 1489 - Catherine Cornaro, Queen of Cyprus and last of the Lusignan dynasty, sold her kingdom to Venice. 1558 - Ferdinand I assumed the title of Holy Roman Emperor without being crowned by the pope. 1590 - In the French Religious Wars, Henry IV, with an army of 13,000, defeated the 25,000-strong army of the Duc de Mayenne at the battle of Ivry. 1629 - Massachusetts Bay Colony received its charter from England. 1647 - In the Thirty Years War, a Treaty of Neutrality was signed at Ulm between France, Sweden, Bavaria and Cologne. 1743 - The City of Boston conducted the first town meeting in Faneuil Hall. It became an idea that caught on quickly throughout New England. 1757 - Died this day, Admiral Byng shot at Portsmouth for failing to relieve Minorca - or as the French put it: "Les anglais tuent de temps à temps un amiral pour encourager les autres". English naval commander, fourth son of Admiral George Byng. He joined the navy at 14, and in 1745 had risen to the rank of rear admiral in the Mediterranean fleet as a result of his father's influence. In 1756, the year he was promoted admiral, he was sent with a poorly equipped squadron to relieve Minorca, at that time blockaded by a French fleet. He failed ignominiously, and was brought home under arrest. Acquitted of cowardice or disaffection, he was found guilty of neglect of duty, and condemned to death. He was shot on board the Monarque at Portsmouth. 1794 - Eli Whitney patented his cotton gin, making it possible to clean 50 pounds of cotton a day, compared to a pound a day before Whitney's invention. (Another source says 13 March 1793). 1812 - By the end of 1811, the United States government had tired of seeing the nation's merchant ships suffer at the hands of the British and French. Having already tried to retaliate through fiscal measures, namely an embargo that only served to hurt US businesses, the government was on the verge of committing its military to what would be later known as the War of 1812. However, scrounging up resources for the war proved to be an issue, leading US President James Madison to call on Congress to provide for means for bolstering the nation's defenses. On 14 March 1812, legislators heeded Madison's plea and approved the issue of the very first war bond, worth some eleven million dollars. Over the next three years of the war, Congress would authorize six more war bonds, and also hike tariffs on imports, all in the name of another battle against Great Britain. 1833 - Born this day, Lucy Hobbs Taylor, D.D.S., dentist. Died in 1910. 1854 - Born this day, Paul Ehrlich, 1908 Nobel prize for medicine. Died in 1915. 1854 - Born this day, Thomas Marshall, vice president under Woodrow Wilson. 1864 - Born this day, [John Luther] Casey Jones, railroad engineer and hero of the ballad Casey Jones. Died in 1900. 1864 - Samuel Baker discovered another source of the Nile in East Africa and named it Lake Albert Nyanza. 1879 - Born this day, Albert Einstein, mathematician, physicist, was born in Ulm, Bavaria. Nobel Prize-winning physicist. Died 18 April 1955. 1883 - Died this day, Karl Marx, German philosopher and father of Communism. 1885 - The Mikado, the comic operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan, premiered at the Savoy Theatre, London. 1891 - The submarine Monarch laid telephone cable along the English Channel bed to prepare for the first telephone links across the Channel. 1892 - Born this day, Matyas Rakosi, former Hungarian Communist ruler of Hungary from 1945 to 1956. Born Matyas Rosenkrantz in Ada, Serbia. Died 5 February 1971, in Gorky [now Nizhny Novgorod], Russia, USSR. 1900 - The United States adopted the gold standard. 1912 - Born this day, Les Brown, bandleader. 1914 - Born this day, Harry Caray, Broadcasters Hall of Fame. Died in 1998. 1915 - In World War I (WWI), the German cruiser Dresden was sunk by the Royal Navy in the Pacific. 1918 - The first seagoing ship made of concrete was launched at Redwood City, California, near San Francisco. The ship was named Faith and those who launched her had plenty of that. They had faith that the vessel wouldn't sink. It didn't. The ship cost $750,000 to build. 1918 - Born this day, Dennis Patrick, actor. 1919 - Born this day, Max Shulman, novelist, playwright. Died in 1988. 1920 - Born this day, Hank Ketcham, cartoonist (Dennis the Menace). 1923 - US President Warren G. Harding became the first Chief Executive to pay taxes and account for his income. Harding's tax bill amounted to nearly $18,000. 1923 - Born this day, Diane Arbus, photographer. 1927 - Born this day, Bill Rexford, auto racer. 1928 - Born this day, [Frederick] Frank Borman, NASA astronaut. 1929 - Died this day, In Chicago, boogie-woogie pioneer Clarence 'Pinetop' Smith was killed as he sat at his piano, by a gunman's bullet not intended for him. He was 24 years old. 1930 - A proposed tunnel linking England and France, was approved by the Channel Tunnel Committee. 1931 - Born this day, Bob Goalby, golf. 1931 - Born this day, Phil Phillips [Baptiste], singer (Sea Of Love). 1932 - Died this day, George Eastman, American photographic pioneer who founded the Kodak company, committed suicide. 1933 - Born this day, Sir Michael Caine, was born Maurice Joseph Micklewhite, Academy Award-winning actor, the son of a billingsgate fish porter. He took his name after seeing the Humphrey Bogart movie, The Caine Mutiny. (Hannah and her sisters, The Ipcress Files, Educating Rita, Get Carter). 1933 - Born this day, Quincy Jones, producer, bandleader, musician, record company executive, born in Chicago, Illinois. Quincy was singing in a vocal quartet aged 10, playing the trumpet aged 14 and won a scholarship to Berklee in Boston. TV and film production work includes theme tunes from: In The Heat Of The Night, Roots, The Crosby Show and The Colour Purple. Apart from releasing his own albums over the past 40 years, Quincy has scored solo hit singles, the 1978 US No.21 hit, Stuff Like That and 1981 UK No.11 single Razzamatazz. Mr. Jones became Vice President of Mercury Records in 1964. Quincy has a record 76 Grammy nominations with 26 wins. He produced the 1963, Lesley Gore US No.1 It's My Party and the American Band Aid single We are The World. Apart from producing the biggest selling album of all time, Michael Jackson's, Off The Wall. Quincy has worked with Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Count Basie, Chaka Khan, Stevie Wonder, and Coolio to name but a few. 1934 - Born this day, [Amdrew] Eugene Cernan, astronaut. 1934 - Born this day, Shirley Scott, musician, blues-oriented organist. 1936 - Born this day, Bob Charles, golf. 1936 - The US government went into the magazine business. There were no advertisements in the publication and very little artwork. The publication is known today as The Federal Register. 1937 - Fred Allen and Jack Benny met on radio in one of the biggest publicity gags ever. It was called The Battle of the Century. The two comedians locked horns in the ballroom of the Hotel Pierre, exchanging torrid insults that were heard by the second largest audience in the history of radio. The 'feud', incidentally, lasted for the next 12 years! 1938 - Nikolai Bukharin, a leading Bolshevik, was executed after being found guilty of counter-revolutionary activities of espionage in one of the most famous show trials of the 1930s. 1938 - On 14 March, Adolf Hitler made his triumphal entry into Vienna, after proclaiming on the 13th, the Anschluss (union) of Germany and Austria, which was actually prohibited by the Treaty of Versailles. On the 11th, Nazi forces had moved across the Austrian border and seized control of the country. Hitler now ruled with absolute power over an empire of 74 million people, as he tried to build up Germany’s ‘Third Reich’ (third empire), which he claimed would last a thousand years. Over the previous few months, Austrian Chancellor Kurt con Schuschnigg had been manipulated by Hitler, and was forced to give more rights and power to Austrian Germans and pro-Nazi officials. On 9 March, he tried to call a public vote on Austria’s independence but instead was forced to resign by Hitler’s second-in-command, Hermann Goering. His successor, Nazi-supporter Arthur Seyss-Inquart, invited the Germans troops into the country on 11 March. The troops, followed by Austrian-born Hitler himself, was eagerly welcomed by Austrian crowds. Many Austrians saw the unification as the solution to reclaim their lost greatness. Austria was later made a German Reich province named Ostmark. 1939 - The 'Timeless' Test between South Africa and England in Durban ended - it started on March 3rd - because the England players had to rejoin their ship. 1939 - Hungary occupied the Carpatho-Ukraine and Slovakia declared its independence. 1940 - Mae West and W.C. Fields made their first joint appearance in the classic film comedy, My Little Chickadee. Despite the popular pairing of the two comedians, West did not like working with Fields, considering him an arrogant, pompous alcoholic. 1940 - Born this day, Eleanor Fount, actress (Women in Love, Bedazzled). 1940 - Born this day, Rita Tushingham, actress (Green Eyes, Dr. Zhivago). 1941 - Years before Desi Arnaz would make the song Babalu popular on the I Love Lucy TV show, Xavier Cugat and his orchestra recorded it with Miguelito Valdes on the vocal. The song was on Columbia Records, as was the Arnaz version years later. 1944 - Born this day, Clyde Lee, basketball. 1945 - Born this day, James O’Rourke, John Fred & His Playboy Band, 1968 US No.1 and UK No.3 single Judy In Disguise. 1945 - Born this day, Walter Parazaider, musician, reeds instrumentalist, sax, Chicago, 1976 UK and US No.1 single If You Leave Me Now, five US NO.1 albums during the 70's. 1945 - On this date in 1945, during World War II (WWII), the 617 Dambuster Squadron of the British Royal Air Force (RAF) dropped the heaviest bomb of the war on the Bielefeld railway viaduct in Germany. Known as the Grand Slam, the 22,000-pound bomb, which was designed by Sir Barnes Wallis, was dropped from an Avro Lancaster flown by RAF Squadron Leader C. C. Calder. The bomb destroyed two full spans of viaduct on the busy railroad, and shock waves from its impact could be felt hundreds of miles away. In its singular destructive power, the Grand Slam was only surpassed by the two US atomic bombs dropped on Japan later in the year. Although Little Boy and Fat Man, as these two bombs are known, were less than half as heavy as the Grand Slam, their shear explosive power reduced the so-called "earthquake" bomb to insignificance. 1945 - Born this day, Robert Davies [Jasper Carrott], in Birmingham, England. He worked as a market trader, driver, sales rep and a lampshade maker before setting up a variety agency and launching a showbiz career as Jasper Carrott. He started as the compere at his own club, The Boggery, before hitting the charts with Funky Moped in 1975. Through TV shows like Carrott's Lib, The Detectives and Back To Front he's established himself as one of Britain's best-loved comedians. 1946 - Born this day, Wes Unseld, basketball. 1946 - Born this day, Jim Pons, The Turtles, 1967 US No.1 single Happy Together, UK No. 4 with She'd Rather Be With Me. 1947 - Born this day, Jona Lewie, 1980 UK No.3 with Stop The Cavalry. 1947 - Born this day, Peter Skellern, singer, songwriter, 1972 UK No.3 with Your A Lady. 1947 - Born this day, Billy Crystal, actor, comedian, writer. 1948 - Born this day, Pam Ayers, poet. 1950 - Born this day, Michael Ford, son of US President Gerald R. Ford. 1950 - The FBI's 10 Most Wanted Fugitives list made its debut. (Anyone know who the first 10 were?) 1950 - Born this day, Rick Dees, disc jockey, comedian, singer, UK 1976 No.6 single Disco Duck (Part One). 1951 - Seoul, South Korea, was recaptured by United Nations (UN) troops during the Korean War. 1954 - The Vietnamese took the Gabrielle strongpoint against the French in the battle of Dien Bien Phu. 1955 - Born this day, Boon Gould, UK rock musician, (Level 42). 1955 - Elvis Presley was interviewed by Jimmy Dean on Jimmy's Washington DC television show. 1955 - CBS talent scout Arther Godfrey turned down Elvis Presley, at the same audition he signed Pat Boone. 1956 - The movie Rock Around The Clock, with Bill Haley, premiered in Washington DC. 1956 - Born this day, Tessa Sanderson, former athlete. 1957 - Born this day, Chris Redburn, Kenny, 1975 UK No.3 single with The Bump. 1958 - Born this day, Prince Albert of Monaco, heir to the throne of Monaco. 1958 - Perry Como received the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA) first gold record on this date, for Catch A Falling Star. The initial criterion for receiving a gold award was $1 million in sales, at retail list price. For singles, which then listed for about $1 each, this represented an equivalent number of records sold. For LPs, the criterion was based on wholesale price, which made sales of about 400,000 albums equivalent to gold status. As LP list prices rose, the quantity of sales necessary to receive the award continuously shrank, necessitating revision in the mid-1970's. 1959 - Elvis Presley made the album charts, but no one would have known by the title of the disk. For LP Fans Only was the first LP ever issued without the artist's name to be found anywhere on the cover - front or back. 1960 - The UK government announced plans for a Thames Barrier to prevent floods. 1960 - The radio telescope at Jodrell Bank, Cheshire set a new record in space-tracking. It made contact with the American Pioneer 5 space probe at the distance of 407,000 miles. The previous record was 290,000 miles by Russia's Lunik 3, which pictured the back of the moon. 1961 - The New English Bible (New Testament) was published. 1961 - Born this day, Kirby Puckett, baseball. 1963 - Gerry Marsden was fined £60 at Uxbridge Magistrates court for attempting to evade customs duty on a guitar bought in Hamburg. 1963 - Born this day, Steve Lambert, Roman Holiday, 1983 UK No.14 single with Don't Try To Stop It. 1963 - From the film of the same name Summer Holiday gave Cliff Richard his seventh UK No.1 single. 1964 - Hollywood stars Elizabeth Taylor and Welsh actor Richard Burton were married in Montreal - her 5th wedding in 4 years. They fell in love on the set of the epic Cleopatra, even though both were already married. Her lateness for the wedding caused Burton to roar that she was a 'fat little tart'. Stormy waters lay ahead, friends commented. 1964 - Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby was convicted of murdering Lee Harvey Oswald, the assassin of President Kennedy. Ruby was sentenced to death but the conviction was overturned and he died of cancer while awaiting a new trial. 1964 - The Dave Clark Five turned professional. 1965 - Israel accepted West Germany's request to establish diplomatic relations. 1965 - Petula Clark made her American TV debut on the Ed Sullivan Show on CBS. 1968 - After two seasons on television, ABC-TV showed the last episode of Batman, starring Adam West and Burt Ward as Robin. The first Batman episode was Hi Diddle Riddle, shown on 12 January 1966. The pilot program for Batman cost $300,000 - quite expensive by 1966 standards. Through the two seasons, the 'Dynamic Duo' welcomed these stars to the cast: Art Carney (The Archer), Tallulah Bankhead (Black Widow), Eartha Kitt (Catwoman), Julie Newmar (Catwoman), Lee Meriwether (Catwoman), Liberace (Chandell), Vincent Price (Egghead), Cesar Romero (The Joker), Rudy Vallee (Lord Phogg), Milton Berle (Louie the Lilac), Shelley Winters (Ma Parker), David Wayne (The Mad Hatter), Zsa Zsa Gabor (Minerva), Van Johnson (The Minstrel), Otto Preminger (Mr. Freeze), Burgess Meredith (The Penguin), John Astin (The Riddler), Frank Gorshin (The Riddler), Cliff Robertson (Shame), Joan Collins (The Siren) and Anne Baxter (Zelda the Great). 1968 - Born this day, Megan Follows, actress. 1969 - Less than one month after winning her first horse race, Barbara Jo Rubin became the first woman jockey to win at Aqueduct Race Course in New York. She rode Brave Galaxy to victory and into the winner's circle. 1969 - The Jimi Hendrix Experience recorded a live concert for Fan Club, the Dutch TV show in Amsterdam, Holland. 1972 - The Cincinnati Royals announced plans to move the National Basketball Association franchise to Kansas City, Missouri. You may think that the Royals not only moved, but changed their sport ... to baseball. However, the Kansas City Royals baseball team was already in place, so the basketball team became the Kings. 1972 - Cosmopolitan magazine released its controversial issue of actor Burt Reynolds in a nude pose. The issue was a quick sell-out, and it rejuvenated Reynolds's lagging acting career. 1973 - Elton John was at No.1 on the US singles chart with Crocodile Rock. 1974 - Stevie Wonder held a press conference to announce that he'll move to Ghana within the next two years (He never did). 1976 - Egypt formally abrogated the 1971 Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation with the Soviet Union. 1978 - Dutch marines succeeded in freeing 71 hostages held by South Moluccans for 29 hours. On 30 June, the South Moluccans were jailed for 15 years. 1979 - At least 200 people died when a Trident aircraft crashed on to a factory outside Peking, China. 1979 - Born this day, Nicolas Anelka, footballer. 1980 - 87 people including a 14-man US boxing team died in an air crash in Warsaw. 1980 - Quincy Jones got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. 1980 - Appearing at the Y.M.C.A. building, Russell St, London, were Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, tickets were £2.50. 1981 - Eric Clapton was hospitalised in St. Paul, Minnesota, with bleeding ulcers, causing a US tour to be cancelled. He was back in hospital five weeks later after being involved in a car crash. 1981 - Roxy Music had their only UK No.1 single with their version of the John Lennon song Jealous Guy. 1983 - OPEC agreed to cut its oil prices by 15 percent for the first time in its 23-year history. 1983 - Born this day, Jordan Taylor Hanson, singer, Hanson, 1997 UK and US No.1 single MMMbop. 1983 - Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora and Alec John Such, got together and formed Bon Jovi. 1984 - Annie Lennox married Hare Krishna devotee Radha Raman. They started divorce proceedings the following year. 1984 - Rainbow played their last ever gig as a band when they performed in Japan. 1984 - Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams was seriously injured by Loyalist gunmen. 1985 - Bill Cosby captured four of the People's Choice Awards for The Cosby Show. The awards were earned from results of a nationwide Gallup Poll. Barbara Mandrell stunned the audience by announcing that she was pregnant and accepted her second award on the show. She talked about "the child here tonight in my tummy." Bob Hope won the award as All-Time Entertainer beating Clint Eastwood and Frank Sinatra for the honour. 1985 - Appearing live Frankie Goes To Hollywood at Sheffield's City Hall. 1985 - The United States evacuated American officials from Lebanon, leaving only a small diplomatic presence in war-torn Beirut. 1985 - Group Dead Or Alive were kicked off UK TV's The Tube, after admitting they were incapable of appearing 'live'. 1986 - On this date in 1986, Microsoft completed a successful initial public offering closing the day at twenty-eight dollars a share, up seven dollars from the offering price. The offering, dubbed 'the IPO of the year' by industry analysts, created a slew of instant tycoons as young Microsoft employees found their stock options suddenly worth something. Microsoft was founded in the mid-1970s, when high school friends and fellow computer nerds Paul Allen and Bill Gates read a Popular Electronics article about a new microcomputer called the Altair 8800. The two had been programming computers since high school, where they developed a system called Traff-o-Data for analyzing traffic data, as well as a registration system that reportedly placed the two in the classes with the most attractive girls. Allen and Gates quickly developed a version of BASIC, a computer language, and licensed it to MITS, maker of the Altair. The two formed a company called Micro-Soft (they later dropped the hyphen). For the next five years, Microsoft concentrated on developing computer languages that would run on the variety of home computers that flooded the market in the late 1970s. Microsoft's lucky break came when operating system guru Gary Kildall of Digital Research missed a meeting with IBM executives because he was out flying his plane: Instead, IBM asked Microsoft for an operating system. Gates quickly purchased the rights to Seattle Computer Products' "Quick and Dirty Operating System" (QDOS), which became MS-DOS, the operating system powering the IBM PC, introduced in 1981. 1986 - Born this day, Jamie Bell, actor. 1987 - Boy George scored his first UK No.1 single as a solo artist with the David Gates song Everything I Own, (It was also a UK No.1 for Ken Boothe in 1974). 1987 - Huey Lewis & The News went to No.1 on the US singles chart with Jacob's Ladder. It was not a hit in the UK. 1987 - The Very Best Of Hot Chocolate went to No.1 on the UK album chart. 1989 - The Bush administration announced it would ban imports of semi-automatic assault rifles indefinitely. 1990 - Flea and Chad Smith from The Red Hot Chili Peppers were arrested for sexually harassing a woman on Daytona beach, Florida, they were each fined $1,000. 1990 - Michael Jackson was voted artist of the decade at the annual Soul Train Awards. 1991 - The emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmed al-Sabah, returned to his war-devastated homeland two weeks to the day after the Gulf War ended. 1991 - Died this day, songwriter Doc Pomus, (Save The Last Dance For Me, Suspicion, Hushabye and many others), of lung cancer in New York. (Another source suggests he died 26 February). 1991 - The 'Birmingham Six', six Irishmen wrongly accused of the 1974 bombing of pubs in Birmingham, England, were freed after 16 years in jail. 1991 - R.E.M. played the first of two nights at London's Borderline Club under the name of Bingo Hand Job. 1991 - Scientists from around the world reported the discovery of the gene that triggers colon cancer. 1992 - A US aircraft carrier was sent to the Persian Gulf as United Nations (UN) officials pressed Iraq on the destruction of weapons in compliance with Security Council resolutions. 1992 - Researchers said a substance occurring naturally in broccoli helps the body fight off cancer-causing chemicals. 1992 - Madness started a three week run at No.1 on the UK album chart with their third compilation LP Divine Madness. 1994 - Senator Robert Packwood, R-Oregon, dropped a court battle to prevent a Senate panel from gaining access to his diaries. The committee was investigating allegations of sexual harassment and influence peddling. 1995 - Testifying at the O.J. Simpson murder trial, Los Angeles police Detective Mark Fuhrman denied allegations that he'd made racist statements. 1995 - Norman Thagard, the first American astronaut to fly in a Russian rocket, blasted off from the icy windswept plains of Kazakhstan. 1996 - US President Bill Clinton committed $100 million for an anti-terrorism pact with Israel to track down and root out Islamic militants. 1996 - Millionaire Steve Forbes withdrew from the presidential contest. 1997 - President Clinton underwent knee surgery at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland after injuring himself while visiting with golfer Greg Norman in Palm Beach, Florida. 1997 - Gangs seeking to oust Albanian President Sali Berisha took control of Tirane, the capital city, as unrest triggered by the collapse of pyramid investment funds the previous month continued. 1998 - Will Smith's hit single Gettin' Jiggy Wit It soared to No.1 in the US, and stayed in the top position for 3 weeks. 1998 - Celine Dion went back to No.1 on the UK singles chart with My Heart Will Go On. 1999 - Stereophonics went to No.1 on the UK album chart with Performance And Cocktails, only the third Welsh band to score a No.1 and the first No.1 album for Richard Branson's V2 label. 2000 - The first cloned pigs were hailed as a breakthrough in the race to 'grow' organs for human transplant. 2001 - Geri Halliwell was banned from driving for 42 days and fined £400 for speeding. Halliwell, 28, admitted driving at 60mph in a 30mph zone in her Aston Martin DB7 on the A411 towards Watford, Hertfordshire, on 31 October 2000. Her lawyer, Nicola-Jane Taylor, told Watford Magistrates the former Spice Girl, who appeared under her full name Geraldine Estelle Halliwell, said she accepted the gravity of the offence and was "very, very sorry". She was also ordered to pay £35 in costs. After sentence was passed, Ms Halliwell smiled at the magistrates' bench, gave a little wave and said: "Thank you. Have a nice day. Goodbye." 2001 - British Prime Minister Tony Blair ordered a step-up in the slaughter of livestock as the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak continued. 2001 - Peter Blake who designed the Beatles classic Sgt Pepper album cover sued the group's record company for more money. Blake was paid £200 for the famous figures in 1967, but was now 'cheesed off' that EMI have never offered to pay more money. 2002 - The US Justice Department announced that the accounting firm Arthur Andersen had been indicted for destroying thousands of documents related to the investigation into the collapse of Enron, the energy-trading company. 2002 - A Libyan security chief convicted of murdering 270 people in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing lost his appeal. 2002 - Alicia Keys played a show in a suite at the House of Commons after young Labour MP David Lammy had booked the American singer. Lammy said he had arranged the show in an attempt to make Paliament more accessible to young people. 2003 - The general in charge of US forces addressed British comrades, telling them: "It's great to have you aboard." |
Trivia
Trivia - petty details or considerations, matters or things that are very unimportant, inconsequential, or nonessential; trifles; trivialities.
Trivial - of very little importance or value; insignificant: "Don't bother me with trivial matters." Trivially - unimportant, nugatory, slight, immaterial, inconsequential, frivolous, trifling.