foolery

English

Etymology

From Middle English foleri, ffollery, equivalent to fool +‎ -ery.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈfuːləɹi/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

Noun

foolery (countable and uncountable, plural fooleries)

1. Foolish behaviour or speech.
   • 1552, Hughe Latymer [i.e., Hugh Latimer], Augustine Bernher, compiler, “[The First Sermon]”, in Certayn Godly Sermons, Made uppon the Lords Prayer, […], London: […] John Day, […], published 1562, →OCLC, folio 5, verso:

     So from that tyme forwarde I began to ſmell the word of god, and forſoke the ſchole doctors and ſuch foolries.

   • c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i]:

     Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun, it shines every where.

   • 1624 (first performance), John Fletcher, Rule a Wife and Have a Wife. A Comoedy. […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] Leonard Lichfield […], published 1640, →OCLC, Act II, scene [ii], page 16:

     A wantonneſſe in wealth, methinks I agree not with, / Tis ſuch a trouble to be married too, / And have a thouſand things of great importance, / Jewells and plates, and fooleries moleſt mee, / To have a mans brains whimſied with his wealth: […]

   • 1836, “Boz” [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], Sketches by “Boz,” Illustrative of Every-day Life, and Every-day People. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: John Macrone, […], →OCLC, chapter IX:

     Tradesmen and clerks, with fashionable novel-reading families, and circulating-library-subscribing daughters, get up small assemblies in humble imitation of Almack’s, and promenade the dingy ‘large room’ of some second-rate hotel with as much complacency as the enviable few who are privileged to exhibit their magnificence in that exclusive haunt of fashion and foolery.

   • 1910, John Millington Synge, “Deirdre of the Sorrows”, in Plays by John M. Synge‎^[1], London: George Allen & Unwin, act I, page 319:

     Though you think, maybe, young men can do their fill of foolery and there is none to blame them.

   • 1949 June 8, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter 2, in Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC; republished [Australia]: Project Gutenberg of Australia, August 2001, part 1, page 1:

     He […] hurried off to the Centre, took part in the solemn foolery of a 'discussion group' […]

Synonyms

• foolishness

Derived terms

• April foolery
• tomfoolery

Translations

foolish behaviour or speech.

• Bulgarian: глупост (bg) f (glupost), щуротия (bg) f (šturotija)
• French: folie (fr) f
• Greek:

  Ancient: φλυαρία f (phluaría)

• Polish: błazenada (pl) f, błazeństwo (pl) n, głupota (pl) f