Word.ws English Dictionary

laughingstock

laughingstock 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 laughingstock

plurallaughingstocks

Origin of laughingstock

From laughing + stock.

Questions about laughingstock

What is laughingstock the alternative spelling of?
Laughingstock is the alternative spelling of laughing stock.

Words near laughingstock in the dictionary

  1. laughing-gear
  2. laughing-stock
  3. laughing-stocks
  4. laughingly
  5. laughings
  6. laughingstock
  7. laughingstocks
  8. laughingthrush
  9. laughingthrushes
  10. Laughland
  11. laughless

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: laughingstock (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: “laughingstock.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/laughingstock. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.