folly

Wikipedia

English

Long Island's Big Duck (blt. 1930-1931), a well known example of an architectural folly (see duck).

Etymology

From Old French folie (“madness”), from the adjective fol (“mad, insane”).

Pronunciation

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒli

Noun

folly (plural follies)

1. Foolishness.

   This is a war of folly.

2. Thoughtless action resulting in tragic consequence.

   The purchase of Alaska from Russia was termed Seward's folly.

3. A fanciful building built for purely ornamental reasons.

   A luncheonette in the shape of a coffee cup is particularly conspicuous, as is intended of an architectural duck or folly.

Related terms

• fool
• foolery
• foolish

Translations

foolishness

• Esperanto: malsaĝeco (eo)
• Finnish: mielettömyys (fi), hulluus (fi), typeryys (fi)
• French: folie (fr), sottise (fr) f
• German: Torheit (de) f, Narrheit (de) f
• Hungarian: butaság (hu), ostobaság (hu)
• Latvian: neprātība (lv) f, neprātīgums (lv) m

• Polish: głupota (pl) f
• Portuguese: bobeira (pt) f
• Russian: глупость (ru) (glúpostʹ) f , недомыслие (ru) (nedomýslije) n , дурь (ru) (durʹ) f , блажь (ru) (blažʹ) f , безрассудство (ru) (bezrassúdstvo) n 
• Scottish Gaelic: amaideachd (gd), amaideas (gd) m

thoughtless action

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 蠢事 (cmn) (chǔnshì)

• Finnish: hullutus (fi), hölmöily (fi), hömpötys (fi)
• Hungarian: könnyelműség (hu)
• Japanese: 愚行 (ja) (ぐこう, gukō)
• Latvian: neprātība (lv) f

• Russian: безрассудство (ru) (bezrassúdstvo) n , прихоть (ru) (príxotʹ) f , блажь (ru) (blažʹ) f , безрассудный поступок (ru) (bezrassúdnyj postúpok) m , глупый поступок (ru) (glúpyj postúpok) m 
• Scottish Gaelic: amaideachd (gd) f

fanciful building

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Help:How to check translations.

Translations to be checked

• Bulgarian: безразсъдство (bg) (bezrazsǎdstvo), безумие (bg) (bezumie)