Word.ws English Dictionary

laughing-stock

laughing-stock is the alternative spelling of laughing stock.

Meaning of laughing stock

Noun

laughing stock (plural laughing stocks)

  1. (idiomatic) An object of ridicule, someone who is publicly ridiculed; the butt of a joke.
    • Pray you let us not be
      laughing-stocks to other men's humours.c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...

Forms of laughing-stock

plurallaughing-stocks

Questions about laughing-stock

What is laughing-stock the alternative spelling of?
Laughing-stock is the alternative spelling of laughing stock.

Words near laughing-stock in the dictionary

  1. laughing water
  2. laughing with
  3. laughing-eyed
  4. laughing-gas
  5. laughing-gear
  6. laughing-stock
  7. laughing-stocks
  8. laughingly
  9. laughings
  10. laughingstock
  11. laughingstocks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: laughing-stock (page history and authors); laughing stock (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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Cite this entry: “laughing-stock.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/laughing-stock. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.