fancy
/ˈfæn.si/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: 4.35 in modern English
13
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
2
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
The imagination.
noun
An image or representation of anything formed in the mind.
noun
An opinion or notion formed without much reflection.
noun
A whim.
noun
Love or amorous attachment.
noun
noun
The object of inclination or liking.
Example Sentences
- "[…] But know that in the soul / Are many lesser faculties, that serve / Reason as chief; among these Fancy next / Her office holds […]"
- "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."
- "Rustic females who habitually chew even pitch or spruce-gum are rendered thereby so repulsive that the fancy refuses to pursue the horror farther and imagine it tobacco […]"
- "[I]n ten minutes more the sun was up, and blazing so fiercely, that we were glad to cool ourselves in fancy, by talking over salmon-fishings in Scotland and New Brunswick, and wadings in icy streams beneath the black pine-woods."
- "For a time she could not soothe nor convince him that it was fancy."
- "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?"
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”). Doublet of fantasia, fantasy, phantasia, and phantasy.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Usage
Inflected Forms
fancies (plural)
fancie (alternative, obsolete)
fansie (alternative, obsolete)
phancie (alternative, obsolete)
phancy (alternative, obsolete)
fancier (comparative)
fanciest (superlative)
fancies (present, singular)
fancying (participle, present)
fancied (participle, past)
fancied (past)
Fancys (plural)