Word.ws English Dictionary

jolly

Syllables: jol·lyUK/ˈd͡ʒɒli/US/ˈd͡ʒɑli/

jolly adjective: full of merriment and high spirits; jovial; joyous; merry. Also the ellipsis of jolly boat.

Adjective

jolly (comparative jollier, superlative jolliest)

  1. Full of merriment and high spirits; jovial; joyous; merry.
    • "Full jolly Knight he seemed […] full large of limb and every joint / He was, and cared not for God or man a point."1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, , stanzas xi-xii
    • "A jolly place," said he, "in times of old! / But something ails it now: the spot is curst. ..."1815, William Wordsworth, Hart-Leap Well, Part Second
    Synonyms:
    jocund, cheerful
  2. (colloquial, dated) Splendid, excellent, pleasant.
    • Jo silently notices how white and small her hand is and what a jolly servant she must be to wear such sparkling rings.1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, chapter 16, in Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853, →OCLC
  3. (informal) Drunk.

Noun

jolly (plural jollies)

  1. (UK, humorous, often) A pleasure trip or excursion; especially, an expenses-paid or unnecessary one.
    • If you know what it means to be a “fidlet” going for a “jolly” in your “doo”, then you are part of an exclusive club that speaks colloquial Antarctic English.2024 June 20, Eva Corlett, “Fidlets, fingies and riding a doo: study sheds light on Antarctic English slang”, in The Guardian
  2. (dated, slang) A marine in the English navy.
    • I'm a Jolly — 'Er Majesty's Jolly — soldier an' sailor too!1896, Rudyard Kipling, Soldier an' Sailor Too
    Synonyms:
    joey
  3. (archaic, slang) A word of praise, or favorable notice.
    • 'We just need to chuck him a jolly.'
      'I beg your pardon?' said Faber.
      'Chuck a jolly... you know! Get people on the street talking about how amazing the show is! Tell them the tickets are sold out for the next two weeks.'2021, Jenni Spangler, The Incredible Talking Machine

Adverb

jolly (comparative more jolly, superlative most jolly)

  1. (UK, dated) Very, extremely.
    • It’s jolly hot in here, isn’t it?
    • “Put these on,” said Carrot firmly, anticipating resistance. “What is it?” said Catweazle in horror. “Coms. Combinations. A vest and long pants all in one,” explained Carrot. “They're jolly warm.”1970, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 127

Verb

jolly (third-person singular simple present jollies, present participle jollying, simple past and past participle jollied)

  1. (transitive) To amuse or divert.
  2. (archaic, informal, transitive) To praise or talk up.
    • I do not believe in 'jollying' and 'soft soaping' a man when his work is really bad.1898, Marketing/Communications, volume 23, page 52

Proper noun capitalized: Jolly

Jolly

  1. A female given name.
  2. A surname.
  3. An unincorporated community in Pike County, Georgia, United States.
  4. An unincorporated community in Newton County, Missouri, United States.
  5. A minor city in Clay County, Texas, United States.
  6. (alternative) Alternative spelling of Jouli, Uttar Pradesh, India.

Also used as

jolly is also the ellipsis of jolly boat.

jolly meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Bengali

jolly in Hindi

जॉली

jolly in Tamil

ஜாலி

jolly in Marathi

जॉली

jolly in Bengali

জলি
More languagesFewer languages
jolly in Telugu
జాలీ
jolly in Malayalam
ജോളി, ജോളിക്ക്, ജോളിക്കു
jolly in Kannada
ಜೋಳಿ, ಜಾಲಿ
jolly in Punjabi
ਜੌਲੀ
jolly in Gujarati
જૉલી, જોલી
jolly in Odia
ଜଲି, ଜୋଲୀ
jolly in Nepali
जॉली, जोली

Examples of jolly in a sentence

  • […] he is swelled into jolly dimensions by frequent potations of malt liquors […]1819, Washington Irving, “The Stage Coach”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.:
  • He'll think about paint and he'll think about glue / What a jolly boring thing to do1971, David Bowie, “Andy Warhol”, in Hunky Dory:

All 40 example sentences with jolly

Synonyms of jolly

8 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of jolly

Forms of jolly

Adjective
comparativejollier
superlativejolliest
Noun
pluraljollies
Adverb
comparativemore jolly
superlativemost jolly
Verb
third-person singular presentjollies
present participlejollying
past participlejollied
pastjollied

Origin of jolly

From Middle English joli, jolif (“merry, cheerful”), from Old French joli, jolif (“merry, joyful”). For the loss of final -f in English, compare tardy, hasty, hussy, etc. It is uncertain whether the Old French word is from Old Norse jól ("a midwinter feast, Yule", hence "fest-ive"), in which case, equivalent to yule + -ive, compare Dutch jolig (“happy, festive, frolicsome, jolly”), West Frisian joelich, joalich (“merry, jolly”), Middle High German jœlich (“hooting, jubilant”). Alternatively, the Old French adjective has been conjectured to derive from a Vulgar Latin *gaudivus (from Latin gaudeō, more at joy), in which case it would require Early Old French ⟨d⟩ /ð/ to irregularly become ⟨l⟩ in jolif rather than being dropped, which is the usual case (alternatively, /l/ may be a hiatus filler inserted into expected *joïf). A possible parallel of ⟨d⟩ to ⟨l⟩ can be seen in the French name Valois, according to one hypothesis from Latin Vadensis, though this origin is itself uncertain and disputed.

* Cognate to the French name Jolie. It derives from the Old French word joli (merriness). * In Punjab (India) it is a corruption of the word jalli.

Words formed from jolly

Phrases with jolly

Words that rhyme with jolly

14 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about jolly

What does jolly mean?
Jolly means full of merriment and high spirits; jovial; joyous; merry.
What is jolly in Hindi?
Jolly in Hindi is जॉली. See Jolly meaning in Hindi.
How do you use jolly in a sentence?
[…] he is swelled into jolly dimensions by frequent potations of malt liquors […]
What part of speech is jolly?
Jolly can be an adjective, a noun, an adverb or a verb.
How do you pronounce jolly?
Jolly is pronounced /ˈd͡ʒɒli/ (UK).

Words near jolly in the dictionary

  1. Jollofs
  2. jollop
  3. jolloped
  4. jollops
  5. jolls
  6. jolly
  7. jolly along
  8. Jolly balance
  9. Jolly balances
  10. jolly bean
  11. jolly beans

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: jolly (page history and authors); Jolly (page history and authors); jolly (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); jolly (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-jolly.ogg.

Cite this entry: “jolly.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/jolly. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.