A calque of Latin locus commūnis, referring to a generally applicable literary passage, itself a calque of Ancient Greek κοινὸς τόπος.

• (America) IPA: /ˈkɑmənˌpleɪs/
• (RP) IPA: /ˈkɒmənˌpleɪs/

commonplace

1. Ordinary; not having any remarkable characteristics.

   Synonyms: routine, undistinguished, unexceptional, Thesaurus:hackneyed

   Antonyms: distinguished, inimitable, unique

   • 1824, Sir Walter Scott, chapter 7, in St. Ronan's Well:

     "This Mr. Tyrrel," she said, in a tone of authoritative decision, "seems after all a very ordinary sort of person, quite a commonplace man."

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC ↗:

     In the old days, to my commonplace and unobserving mind, he gave no evidences of genius whatsoever. He never read me any of his manuscripts, […], and therefore my lack of detection of his promise may in some degree be pardoned.

   • 1911, Joseph Conrad, chapter 1, in Under Western Eyes:

     I could get hold of nothing but of some commonplace phrases, those futile phrases that give the measure of our impotence before each other's trials.

• French: ordinaire, banal
• German: alltäglich, banal, gang und gäbe, gewöhnlich, abgedroschen, normal, fade
• Italian: ordinario, banale
• Portuguese: corriqueiro, banal, prosaico, comum, rotineiro
• Russian: обыкнове́нный
• Spanish: común, común y corriente

commonplace (plural commonplaces)

1. A platitude or cliché.
   • 1899, Stephen Crane, chapter 17, in Active Service:

     Finally he began to mutter some commonplaces which meant nothing particularly.

   • 1910, Elinor Glyn, chapter 4, in His Hour:

     And something angered Tamara in the way the Prince assisted in all this, out-commonplacing her friend in commonplaces with the suavest politeness.

2. Something that is ordinary; something commonly done or occurring.
   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC ↗, page 137 ↗:

     It is odd how easily the common-places of morality or of sentiment glide off in conversation. Well, they are "exceedingly helpful," and so Lord Avonleigh found them.

   • 1891 [September, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Adventure III.—A Case of Identity.”, in Geo[rge] Newnes, editor, The Strand Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly, volume II (July to December), number [9], London: […], page 248 ↗, column 1:

     "MY dear fellow," said Sherlock Holmes, as we sat on either side of the fire in his lodgings at Baker-street, "life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. […]"

3. A memorandum; something to be frequently consulted or referred to.
   • 1710, Jonathan Swift, A Discourse concerning the Mechanical Operation of the Spirit:

     Whatever, in my reading, occurs concerning this our fellow creature, I do never fail to set it down by way of common-place.

4. A commonplace book.

• French: lieu commun
• German: Gemeinplatz, Allgemeinplatz, Plattitüde, Floskel, Binsenweisheit, Binsenwahrheit
• Italian: luogo comune
• Portuguese: lugar-comum, chavão
• Russian: клише
• Spanish: lugar común, tópico, cliché, clisé, perogrullada

• German: Normalität, Alltäglichkeit
• Italian: fatto normale
• Portuguese: lugar-comum
• Russian: банальность
• Spanish: lugar común

commonplace (commonplaces, present participle commonplacing; simple past and past participle commonplaced)

1. To make a commonplace book.
2. To enter in a commonplace book, or to reduce to general heads.
   • 1711, Henry Felton, Dissertation on Reading the Classics:

     I do not apprehend any difficulty in collecting and commonplacing an universal history from the […] historians.

3. (obsolete) To utter commonplaces; to indulge in platitudes.
   • 1910, Elinor Glyn, chapter 4, in His Hour:

     And something angered Tamara in the way the Prince assisted in all this, out-commonplacing her friend in commonplaces with the suavest politeness.

   • c. January 1620, Francis Bacon, letter to the King

     For the good that comes of particular and select committees and commissions, I need not commonplace.

• commonplace book