Word.ws English Dictionary

ganfer

ganfer noun: a kind of ghost found in the folklore of Orkney and Shetland.

Noun

ganfer (plural ganfers)

  1. A kind of ghost found in the folklore of Orkney and Shetland.
    • […] by Ghosts here called Ganfers, in all which many place more confidence than in the more reasonable propositions that can be adduced to convince them of the absurdity of such notions.1879, George Low, A tour through the islands of Orkney and Schetland, with an intr. by J. Anderson, page 8
    • ... Ganfers or ghosts are, however, very commonly seen, particularly by the sagacious shelty.1891, Samuel Hibbert, A Description of the Shetland Islands: Comprising an Account of Their Scenery, Antiquities and Superstitions. Edinburgh, A. Constable and Co. [etc., Etc.] 1822, page 249

Forms of ganfer

pluralganfers

Origin of ganfer

Originally a dialectal term from Shetland and Orkney, also denoting certain negative atmospheric phenomena. Thought to ultimately derive from Old Norse gandferð (“gand-journey”), with the first element connected to Old Norse gandr (“evil spirit”). Compare dialectal Norwegian gannfar, gandferd

Questions about ganfer

What does ganfer mean?
Ganfer means a kind of ghost found in the folklore of Orkney and Shetland.
What part of speech is ganfer?
Ganfer is a noun.
What is the plural of ganfer?
The plural of ganfer is ganfers.

Words near ganfer in the dictionary

  1. ganev
  2. ganevim
  3. ganevs
  4. Ganey
  5. Ganeys
  6. ganfer
  7. ganfers
  8. gang
  9. gang bang
  10. gang bangs
  11. gang cask

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ganfer (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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