Word.ws English Dictionary

the dear knows

the dear knows phrase: god knows; nobody knows.

Phrase

the dear knows

  1. (Ireland, dated) God knows; nobody knows
    • O thou, whom poets call Melpomene,
      Who hast inspir'd, the dear knows how many
      In ancient times to sing O Dear O's
      On hapless fates of unknown heroes,1806 'Caleb Thistle' "How are the mighty fallen!" in The Evening Fire-side; or Literary Miscellany (Philadelphia; 10 May 1806) Vol.II No.19 p.147
    • I know where I’m going,
      I know who’s going with me,
      I know who I love,
      But the dear knows who I’ll marry.19th century Anonymous Irish or Scottish ballad, I Know Where I’m Going
  2. (Ireland, dated) God knows; of course, certainly, nobody could doubt
    • Then she gave a little sigh and said: ‘Ah, well! We did our best, the dear knows.’1904–1907 (date written), James Joyce, “A Mother”, in Dubliners, London: Grant Richards, published June 1914, →OCLC, page 173
    • The dear knows your father worked hard enough for the money he is laying out on your education.1939, Flann O'Brien, chapter 1, in At Swim-two-birds

Origin of the dear knows

Unclear. Bliss and Dolan suggest a conflation of dear, as in "oh dear" or "the Dear Lord", and deer, by analogy with the conflation in Irish of Fiadha "God" and fiadh "deer".

Questions about the dear knows

What does the dear knows mean?
The dear knows means god knows; nobody knows.
What part of speech is the dear knows?
The dear knows is a phrase.

Words near the dear knows in the dictionary

  1. the darkest place is under the candlestick
  2. the day
  3. the day before
  4. the daylight out of
  5. the daylights out of
  6. the dear knows
  7. the deuce
  8. the deuce you say
  9. the devil
  10. the devil a one
  11. the devil and the deep blue sea

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: the dear knows (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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