drollery

drollery

English

Alternative forms

• drolerie (archaic)

Etymology

From French drôlerie, from drôle +‎ -erie; equivalent to droll +‎ -ery.

Noun

drollery (countable and uncountable, plural drolleries)

1. Comical quality.
   • 1915, W.S. Maugham, Of Human Bondage, chapter 121:

     He found that Sally had a restrained, but keen, sense of the ridiculous, and she made remarks about the girls or the men who were set over them which amused him by their unexpected drollery.

2. Amusing behavior.
3. Something humorous, funny or comical.
4. (archaic) A puppet show; a comic play or entertainment; a comic picture; a caricature.
   • 1610–1611, William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act III, scene iii], page 13:

     Sebastian: A liuing Drolerie : now I will beleeue
     That there are Vnicornes : that in Arabia
     There is one Tree, the Phœnix throne, one Phœnix
     At this houre reigning there.

5. A joke; a funny story.
6. A small decorative image in the margin of an illuminated manuscript.

Translations

comical quality

Irish: ábhacht f, áiféis f, aisteachas m, aistiúlacht f, anstrólaíocht f, barrúlacht f, léaspartaíocht f

Russian: ю́мор (ru) m (júmor)

amusing behavior

Irish: (please verify) áiféis f, léaspartaíocht f, anstrólaíocht f

Russian: чудакова́тость (ru) f (čudakovátostʹ)

a puppet show

References

• “drollery” in The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989, →ISBN.