Word.ws English Dictionary

doddard

doddard noun: a frail old man.

Noun (1)

doddard (plural doddards)

  1. A frail old man.
    • You are too old and too exacting to be satisfied with a blank page. You would certainly prefer one upon which life has written something. It is more interesting. Young girls are only for youths and for certain brainless doddards.1934, Sigurd Christiansen, translated by Isaac Anderson, “The Storm”, in Chaff Before the Wind, New York, N.Y.: Liveright Publishing Corporation, page 266
    • President Roosevelt and the former King Edward collect stamps, along with thousands of others, ranging from six-year-olds to ninety-seven year old^([sic]) doddards.1937 March 25, B. C. Hagglund, “[Views and Reviews] The Collective Instinct”, in Tri-County Forum, volume V, number 51, Thief River Falls, Minn., page two, column 5

Noun (2)

doddard (plural doddards)

  1. (rare) A moribund or decayed tree.
    • […] / Another ſhakes the Bed; diſſolving there, / Till knots upon his Gouty Joints appear, / And Chalk is in his crippled Fingers found; / Rots like a Doddard Oke, and piecemeal falls to the ground.1693, Aulus Persius Flaccus, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Aulus Persius Flaccus.] The Fifth Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […] Together...
    • Trees when lopped were dodded and became doddards.1955, Ivor Brown, Chosen Words, London: Jonathan Cape, […], page 179

Examples of doddard in a sentence

  • Yes . . . the old doddards who listen to military bands in the public park.1939, Jean Sarment, translated by Frances Keene and Adrienne Foulke, “Rude Awakening”, in Eisig Silberschlag, Frederick Lehner, editors...
  • Secondly, the members of the Oporto Junta were no better than inept doddards, none of whom possessed any personal prestige.1947, Marcus Cheke, chapter XXVII, in Carlota Joaquina, Queen of Portugal, Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, published 1969...
  • Pound challenged one poet to a duel because he was “stupid,” as he attacked the “elderly muttonheads” and the Victorian “doddards” much in the manner of Mencken, his friend, at home.1955, Van Wyck Brooks, The Confident Years: 1885-1915 (Everyman’s Library), New York, N.Y.: E. P. Dutton and Company, Inc.; London: J. M....
  • Drool flecked the lips of doddards and ponies alike.1969 July, Norman Spinrad, “The Last Hurrah of the Golden Horde”, in New Worlds, number 192, London: New Worlds Publishing, page 26, column...

Forms of doddard

pluraldoddards

Origin of doddard

Possibly from dodder (“to shake or tremble as one moves, especially as of old age”) + -ard. The Scottish National Dictionary, a Scots dictionary, defining doddard as “A foolish old man, a dotard”, and providing an 1823 quotation, gives the etymology as either a variant of dotard, comparing Early Modern English dodart, or perhaps related to doddered, with spelling influenced by dotard.

Questions about doddard

What does doddard mean?
Doddard means a frail old man.
How do you use doddard in a sentence?
Yes . . . the old doddards who listen to military bands in the public park.
What part of speech is doddard?
Doddard is a noun.
What is the plural of doddard?
The plural of doddard is doddards.

Words near doddard in the dictionary

  1. dodab
  2. dodabs
  3. dodad
  4. dodads
  5. dodd
  6. doddard
  7. doddards
  8. doddart
  9. doddarts
  10. dodded
  11. dodder

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: doddard (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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