/ nəʊm; NAmE noʊm/ noun
1.
(in stories) a creature like a small man with a pointed hat, who lives under the ground and guards gold and treasure
2.
a plastic or stone figure of a gnome, used to decorate a garden
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WORD ORIGIN
mid 17th cent.: from French , from modern Latin gnomus , a word used by Paracelsus as a synonym of Pygmaeus , denoting a mythical race of very small people said to inhabit parts of Ethiopia and India (compare with pygmy ).