fancy

Decorative, or featuring decorations, especially intricate or diverse ones.

Adjective

  1. Decorative, or featuring decorations, especially intricate or diverse ones.
    • This is a fancy shawl.

    Synonyms: decorative ornate

    Antonyms: plain simple

  2. Of a superior grade.
    • This box contains bottles of the fancy grade of jelly.

    Synonyms: high-end

  3. Executed with skill.
    • He initiated the game-winning play with a fancy deked saucer pass to the winger.
    • It took some fancy footwork to make it happen.
  4. Unnecessarily complicated.
    • I'm not keen on him and his fancy ideas.

    Synonyms: highfalutin

    Antonyms: simple

  5. Extravagant; above real value.
    • This anxiety never degenerated into a monomania, like that which led his [Frederick the Great's] father to pay fancy prices for giants. - 1859, Thomas Macaulay, The Life of Frederick the Great:

Origin

From Middle English fansy, fantsy, a contraction of fantasy, fantasye, fantasie, from Old French fantasie, from Medieval Latin fantasia, from Late Latin phantasia (“an idea, notion, fancy, phantasm”), from Ancient Greek φαντασία (phantasía), from φαντάζω (phantázō, “to render visible”), from φαντός (phantós, “visible”), from φαίνω (phaínō, “to make visible”); from the same root as φάος (pháos, “light”); ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰh₂nyéti, from the root *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”). Doublet of fantasia, fantasy, phantasia, and phantasy.

Forms

fancier fanciest fancie fansie phancie phancy

Derived

fancible fancify fanciless fanciness fancy ball fancy bread fancy Dan fancy dress Fancy Dutch fancy fair fancy girl fancy goods fancy house fancy ketchup fancy line fancy maid fancy man fancy meat fancymonger fancy-pants fancy pants fancy roller fancy sauce fancy-schmancy

Adverb

  1. In a fancy manner; fancily.
    • I igonored it, hurdling her navel, riding her torso and taking both her breasts in my hands and mashing them none too fancy. - 1970, Troy Conway, The Cunning Linguist, London: Flamingo Books, page 131:

Forms

fancie fansie phancie phancy

Noun

  1. The imagination.
    • […] But know that in the soul / Are many lesser faculties, that serve / Reason as chief; among these Fancy next / Her office holds […] - 1667, John Milton, “Book V”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons],...
    • In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish’d dove; / In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. - 1835, Alfred Tennyson, “Locksley Hall”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward...
    • Rustic females who habitually chew even pitch or spruce-gum are rendered thereby so repulsive that the fancy refuses to pursue the horror farther and imagine it tobacco […] - 1861 December, Thomas Wentworth Higginson,...
  2. An image or representation of anything formed in the mind.
    • How now, my lord! why do you keep alone, / Of sorriest fancies your companions making, / Using those thoughts which should indeed have died / With them they think on? - c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The...
    • Her timbers were olden dreams dreamed long ago, and poets’ fancies made her tall, straight masts, and her rigging was wrought out of the people’s hopes. - 1905, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of...

    Synonyms: conception thought idea

  3. An opinion or notion formed without much reflection.
    • VVhen you have vvell vievved the Scenes and Deviliſh ſhapes of this Practical Metamorphoſis, and ſcan'd them in your ſerious thoughts, you vvill vvonder at their audacious phant'ſies, vvho ſeem to hold Specifical...
    • I have always had a Fancy, that Learning might be made a Play and Recreation to Children […] - 1693, [John Locke], “(please specify the section number)”, in Some Thoughts Concerning Education, London: […] A[wnsham] and...
    • I dare say I am merely a foolish woman with a young girl's fancies. - 1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

    Synonyms: impression

  4. A whim.
    • I had a fancy to learn to play the flute.

    Synonyms: boutade caprice capriccio conceit crotchet delirament fancy fangle figary flisk freak kink lark maggot megrim spleen toy vagary whim whim-wham whimsy

  5. Love or amorous attachment.
    • And they’ve taken a fancy to me, Aunt said. Kitto and the others. That means they like me. - 1967, Barbara Sleigh, Jessamy, Sevenoaks, Kent: Bloomsbury, published 1993, →ISBN, page 36:

    Synonyms: affinity bag bent cup of coffee cup of joe cup of tea dish fancy liking partiality penchant predilection predisposition preference proclivity propension propensity shine taste thing

  6. Liking.
    • He took a fancy to the goods in the window.
  7. The object of inclination or liking.
    • For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself / To fit your fancies to your father’s will; - c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories,...
  8. Any sport or hobby pursued by a group.
    • Trainspotting is the fancy of a special lot.
    • the cat fancy

    Synonyms: hobby amusement avocation diversion divertisement fancy kill-time pastime pursuit sport

  9. The enthusiasts of such a pursuit.
    • He fell out of favor with the boxing fancy after the incident.
    • […] at a great book sale in London, which had congregated all the Fancy, on a copy occurring, not one of the company but ourself knew what the mystical title-page meant. - 1830 September, Thomas De Quincey, “Review of...

    Synonyms: admirer aficionado buff connoisseur enthusiast devotee maniac fan fanatic fancier fancy fiend freak geek junkie partisan rooter zealot

  10. A diamond with a distinctive colour.
  11. That which pleases or entertains the taste or caprice without much use or value.
    • 18th century, John Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving Land, cited in Samuel Johnson, A Dictionary of the English Language, 1755, London-pride is a pretty fancy, and does well for...
  12. A bite-sized sponge cake, with a layer of cream, covered in icing.
    • a French fancy; a fondant fancy; cream fancies

Forms

fancies fancie fansie phancie phancy

Derived

blood-red fancy border fancy catch someone's fancy fanciful fancy-free fancy mouse fancy rat fancy-sick flight of fancy strike someone's fancy take a fancy to take someone's fancy tickle someone's fancy

Verb

  1. To appreciate without jealousy or greed.
    • I fancy your new car, but I like my old one just fine.
  2. Would like; have a desire for.
    • I fancy a burger tonight for dinner.
    • Do you fancy going to town this weekend?

    Synonyms: feel like

  3. To be sexually, aesthetically or romantically attracted to.
    • I fancy that girl over there.
    • How can you fancie one that lookes so fierce, / Onely diſpoſed to martiall Stratagems? / UUho when he ſhal embrace you in his arms / UUil tell how many thouſand men he ſlew. - c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher...
    • “Hanna’s different,” I said. ”Oh yes, isn’t she?” she said scornfully. “Because you fancy her. Well, you’re not likely to impress her talking that way. - 1988, John Christopher, When the Tripods Came:

    Synonyms: like

  4. To imagine, suppose.
    • [dated] I fancy you'll want something to drink after your long journey.
    • I fancy this is an error.
    • Fancy meeting you here!
  5. To form a conception of; to portray in the mind.
    • he whom I fancy, but can ne'er express - 1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Seventh Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into...
    • It was such a scene of confusion as you can hardly fancy. All the lockfast places had been broken open in quest of the chart. - 1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company,...

    Synonyms: imagine

  6. To have a fancy for; to like; to be pleased with, particularly on account of external appearance or manners.
    • We fancy not the cardinal. - 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
  7. To breed (animals) as a hobby.
    • I would recommend this little book very highly to anyone who fancies pigeons, novices and veterans alike. - 1973, American Pigeon Journal, page 159:

Origin

From Middle English fancien, fantasien, fantesien, from Old French fantasier, from the noun (see above)).

Forms

fancies fancying fancied fancie fansie phancie phancy

Related

fantasy fancy man fancypants fancy woman fancy is as fancy does

Derived

disfancy fanciable fancier fancy is as fancy does fancy one's chances fancy seeing you here fancy that fancy up I don't fancy yours