Noun: jolly
| Singular | jolly |
| Plural | jollies |
Sample Sentences
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If you know what it means to be a “fidlet” going for a “jolly” in your “doo”, then you are part of an exclusive club that speaks colloquial Antarctic English. [2024 June 20, Eva Corlett, “Fidlets, fingies and riding a doo: study sheds light on Antarctic English slang”, in The Guardian:]
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I'm a Jolly — 'Er Majesty's Jolly — soldier an' sailor too! [1896, Rudyard Kipling, Soldier an' Sailor Too:]
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'We just need to chuck him a jolly.'
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'I beg your pardon?' said Faber.
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'Chuck a jolly... you know! Get people on the street talking about how amazing the show is! Tell them the tickets are sold out for the next two weeks.' [2021, Jenni Spangler, The Incredible Talking Machine:]
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Indeed it is nearly impossible to conceive how the small jolly they were in could have escaped destruction for a single instant. [1838, [Edgar Allan Poe], The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:]
Nouns inflected like jolly
clitoridectomy,
royal jelly,
whoopsy,
surrogacy,
urinary,
rastrography,
renoscopy,
sourtop blueberry,
forcible entry,
superficiary,
lipidosity,
potability,
phonography,
hyperproperty,
greenery,
conjugality,
ring singularity,
Brittany,
ignobility,
obscurity, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
1. From Middle English joli, jolif (“merry, cheerful”), from Old French joli, jolif (“merry, joyful”). For the loss of final -f in English, compare tardy, hasty, hussy, etc.
2. It is uncertain whether the Old French word is from Old Norse jól ("a midwinter feast, Yule", hence "fest-ive"), in which case, equivalent to yule + -ive, compare Dutch jolig (“happy, festive, frolicsome, jolly”), West Frisian joelich, joalich (“merry, jolly”), Middle High German jœlich (“hooting, jubilant”). Alternatively, the Old French adjective has been conjectured to derive from a Vulgar Latin *gaudivus (from Latin gaudeō, more at joy), in which case it would require Early Old French ⟨d⟩ /ð/ to irregularly become ⟨l⟩ in jolif rather than being dropped, which is the usual case (alternatively, /l/ may be a hiatus filler inserted into expected *joïf). A possible parallel of ⟨d⟩ to ⟨l⟩ can be seen in the French name Valois, according to one hypothesis from Latin Vadensis, though this origin is itself uncertain and disputed. See: Old Norse Nouns '
jól', Latin Nouns '
gaudeō'.