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daft

adj
/dɑːft/UK/dæft/US

Etymology

From Middle English dafte, defte (“gentle; having good manners; humble, modest; awkward; dull; boorish”), from Old English dæfte (“accommodating; gentle, meek, mild”), from Proto-West Germanic *daftī (“fitting, suitable”). Related to Old English dafnian, dafenian (“to be fitting, appropriate, or becoming”), Russian до́брый (dóbryj, “good”). Doublet of deft. Compare silly which originally meant “blessed; good, innocent; pitiful; weak”, but now means “laughable or amusing through foolishness or a foolish appearance; mentally simple, foolish”. Unrelated to, though perhaps influenced by, daff (“fool (n.); to be foolish (v.)”) (past form daffed).

  1. inherited from *daftī✻ — “fitting, suitable”
  2. inherited from dæfte — “accommodating; gentle, meek, mild”
  3. inherited from dafte

Definitions

  1. Foolish, silly, stupid.

    • a daft idea
    • Thou art the daftest fuill that ever I saw. / Trows thou, man, be the law to get remeid / Of men of kirk? Na, nocht till thou be deid.

  2. Crazy, insane, mad.

  3. Gentle, meek, mild.

    • There's mirth in the barn and the ha', the ha', / There's mirth in the barn and the ha': / There's quaffing and laughing, / And dancing and daffing; / And our young bride's daftest of a', of a', / And our young bride's daftest of a'.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for daft. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA