fancy
Forms
- Plural
- fancies
- Comparative
- fancier
- Superlative
- fanciest
Definitions
1.The imagination.
- For a time she could not soothe nor convince him that it was fancy.
- In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish’d dove; / In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.
2.An image or representation of anything formed in the mind.
- Her timbers were olden dreams dreamed long ago, and poets’ fancies made her tall, straight masts, and her rigging was wrought out of the people’s hopes.
- How now, my lord! why do you keep alone, / Of sorriest fancies your companions making, / Using those thoughts which should indeed have died / With them they think on?
3.An opinion or notion formed without much reflection.
- I dare say I am merely a foolish woman with a young girl's fancies.
4.A whim.
- I had a fancy to learn to play the flute.
1.Decorative, or featuring decorations, especially intricate or diverse ones.
- This is a fancy shawl.
2.Of a superior grade.
- This box contains bottles of the fancy grade of jelly.
3.Executed with skill.
- It took some fancy footwork to make it happen.
- He initiated the game-winning play with a fancy deked saucer pass to the winger.
4.Unnecessarily complicated.(colloquial)
- I'm not keen on him and his fancy ideas.
Frequency
Overall
Rare· #4887
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Rare
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Related words
Etymology
From Middle English fansy, fantsy, a contraction of fantasy, fantasye, fantasie, from Old French fantasie, from Medieval Latin fantasia, from Late Latin phantasia (“an idea, notion, fancy, phantasm”), from Ancient Greek φαντασία (phantasía), from φαντάζω (phantázō, “to render visible”), from φαντός (phantós, “visible”), from φαίνω (phaínō, “to make visible”); from the same root as φάος (pháos, “light”); ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰh₂nyéti, from the root *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”).