| 释义 |
dotty, a.|ˈdɒtɪ|
[f. dot n.1 + -y1.]
1. Consisting of or characterized by dots; dot-like.
1812Examiner 30 Nov. 763/2 That dotty softness, which confers so..natural a character on the flesh. 1879Stevenson Trav. Cevennes 80 A low dotty underwood that grew thickly in the gorges.
2. Of unsteady, uneven or feeble gait, as from stiffness or lameness. Hence fig., feeble in mind, silly. colloq. or dial.
14..in J. Glyde New Suffolk Garland (1866) 213 Ale mak many a mane to have a doty poll. 1870Sportsman 9 Apr. (Farmer), He begins to go a little stiff in his limbs and dotty on his feet. 1884Daily Tel. 9 Apr. 2/6 (ibid.) He [a race-horse] pulled up in a dotty condition. 1885Standard 13 Mar. 6/6, I am not mad, drunk, or dotty. 1888E. Laws Hist. Little England 420/1 Dotty, silly from age; senile. 1896Evesham Jrnl. 28 Nov. (E.D.D.), The Council hardly knows if he has not gone ‘dotty’. 1936Bentley & Allen Trent's Own Case vii. 73 The Englishman looked sick and a bit dotty. 1948R. Lehmann Note in Music (ed. 2) iv. 130 Quite wrapped up in herself—with something pretty rum staring out of her eyes. A bit dotty, perhaps. 1971Sunday Times 16 May 32/8 Taya Zinkin, with a kind of dotty inevitability, ends as an authority on India.
Hence ˈdottily adv., in a ‘dotty’, mad, or eccentric manner; absurdly, crazily; ˈdottiness, (a) unsteadiness of gait; (b) (colloq.) eccentricity, feeble-mindedness, craziness.
1888Matlock Visiting List 29 Aug. 3/3 An amount of dottiness like the lurching of a landsman on a rolling steamer. 1934Webster, Dottily. 1934Wodehouse Thank You, Jeeves xii. 162 Dotty, beyond a question. And who knew but what that dottiness might not run in the family? 1959P. Bull I know the Face viii. 135, I was in the witness-box or court throughout and was drugged to the point of dottiness. 1969Dottily [see honeyish a.]. 1978Economist 4 Feb. 14/1 The cardinal hesitates... He is looking over his shoulder at his conservative fellow bishops in the Catholic hierarchy, for whom dottily enough he is not the spokesman. 1984Financial Times 5 June 19/5 The fable of the Little Mermaid provides a symbolic leitmotiv that recurs from the opening scene when Mette's dottily genteel mother..recalls the mortal prince loved by a sea-creature. |