| 释义 |
granny, grannie|ˈgrænɪ|
Also 7 grannee, 8 grany, Sc. graunie.
[See -ie, -y4; the dim. is prob. formed on grannam, grandam, rather than on grandmother n.]
1. a. A familiar, endearing, or contemptuous synonym of grandmother n. Also used loosely for ‘an old woman’, ‘a gossip’.
1663Dryden Wild Gallant ii. i, I never knew your Grand⁓mother was a Scotch woman..: pray whistle for her, and lets see her dance: come—whist Grannee! 1785Burns Addr. Deil v, My reverend Graunie. 1810Cromek's Rem. Nithsdale Song 51 The gladness which dwalls in their auld grannie's ee. 1816Gentl. Mag. LXXXVI. i. 522 This old grannie..sends a message to the Earl. 1821Clare Vill. Minstr. I. 22 What things were seen in granny's younger days. 1856Miss Mulock J. Halifax xxxix. (ed. 22) 414 ‘Me want to see Grannie and Uncle Guy.’ 1861Max Müller Chips (1880) II. xxiv. 247 Stories..for which we are indebted to the old grannies in every village. 1889Harper's Mag. Feb. 376/1 ‘Fairly good holy images thou hast here, granny’..said I to the old woman.
fig.1726Amherst Terræ Fil. viii. 36 From the earliest accounts that we have of these two contending grannies [Oxford and Cambridge] they were untoward cross grain'd baggages from children.
b. phr. (Cf. grandam 1 b.)
1793Fitzgerald in European Mag. xxvi. 387 Go teach your granny. 1845Lond. Jrnl. I. 191 Now they are taught to teach their grannies how to suck eggs.
c. your granny!: used as an exclamation suggesting derision or disbelief. (Cf. grandmother n. 1 b.)
1838J. C. Neal Charcoal Sks. 35 ‘War!’ ejaculated the party; ‘oh, your granny!’ 1858Geo. Eliot Scenes Clerical Life I. 65 ‘Well,’ suggested John,..‘you should wet the bottom of the duree a bit, to hold it from slippin'.’ ‘Wet your granny!’ returned the cook. 1863Ladies' Repository XXIII. 482/2 ‘Repose, your granny,’ answered Addie, who, when vexed never stopped for elegant phrases. 1876‘Mark Twain’ Tom Sawyer xxv. 193 ‘Do they hop?’ ‘Hop—your granny! No.’ 1939‘F. O'Brien’ At Swim-two-Birds i. 13, I open several books every day, I answered. You open your granny, said my uncle.
2. U.S. local. A nurse or midwife. (Cf. granny v.)
1794Washington Let. Writings 1892 XIII. 18 An application was made to me by Kate at Muddy hole..to serve the negro women (as a Grany) on my estate.
3. dial. A stupid person, ‘old woman’.
1887S. Chesh. Gloss., Granny, a simpleton: used of both sexes. 1897Daily News 20 Dec. 8/5 Characterising the..officials as a set of what they called in Scotland grannies, a parcel of old women [etc.].
4. Short for granny knot.
1865in Slang. Dict. a1894Stevenson St. Ives cxxxiv. (1898) 283 He tied his knots into ‘grannies’.
5. U.S. ‘A duck, the south-southerly or old-wife. More fully, old granny’ (Cent. Dict.).
6. Short for granny bond. colloq.
1981Sunday Times 23 Aug. 45/6 (heading) ‘Grannies’ in lead. 1982Ibid. 10 Oct. 57/1 It's time to throw out your ‘grannies’—they are no longer earning their keep. The reason people are ditching their ‘grannies’ is plain to see.
7. Comb., as granny-armchair, granny collarette, granny dress, granny glasses, granny gown, granny hat, granny print, granny skirt; granny bashing, battering colloq., the assault or mugging of elderly persons; spec. violence towards an elderly member of one's family, esp. one's grandmother; granny bond, a familiar name for an index-linked National Savings certificate available originally only to a person of pensionable age; granny bonnet, muff, a bonnet or muff of a shape resembling those of Victorian grandmothers; granny flat, a self-contained living unit for an elderly relative forming part of or detached from the family home; granny knot = granny's knot; granny's bend, knot (see quots.); granny's nightcap, dial. name for various plants.
1946Koestler Thieves in Night 146 There were mattresses, saucepans, a cuckoo-clock, a *granny-armchair, a bicycle and even a bird-cage.
1975Observer 7 Sept. 2 (heading) Doctor warns on *granny-bashing. 1979E. Deeping Caring for Elderly Parents vi. 116 ‘Granny-bashing’ is now well established on the list, along with ‘mugging’ and ‘football hooliganism’. 1981Pulse 24 Oct. 45 (heading) Granny bashing signs are passing GPs by.
1975G. Burston in Brit. Med. Jrnl. 6 Sept. 592/3 Perhaps general practitioners..and casualty officers..should become as conscious of *granny-battering as they are now aware of baby-battering. 1984M. Eastman Old Age Abuse 9 The term ‘granny battering’ has in recent years caught the imagination of the so-called helping professions as well as the media.
1977Sunday Times 4 Sept. 71/5 The 1,200,000 pension-age people (men over 65, women over 60) who have money tucked away in National Savings Retirement certificates—now endearingly known as *granny bonds. 1981Times 31 July 1/7 Granny bonds are to be made available to everyone from September 7. 1984Daily Tel. 17 Dec. 12/2 Bonuses on granny bonds not encashed..increased the value of investments by..{pstlg}269 million.
1894Daily News 30 Oct. 6/6 *Granny bonnets are revived.
1880Queen 10 July (Advt.), The ‘Granny’ shade hat,..The ‘*Granny’ collarette.
1909Westm. Gaz. 3 Apr. 15/2 The best dress⁓makers are preparing what they call ‘*Grannie’ dresses. 1966Punch 29 June 946/1 The social columns continue to keep us informed in their eager girlish way about where the ‘in’ crowd are currently surging in their Granny dresses, Stalin caps, sawn-off skirtlets and mini-beards.
1965New Society 16 Sept. 22/1 The idea of ‘*grannyflats’ was put forward..attached to family houses. These might well satisfy a widow or widower's desire for independence while enabling them to live in close contact with their family. 1981‘M. Innes’ Lord Mullion's Secret ix. 70 It seemed wholly amiable in the Mullions to incorporate this not particularly close kinswoman in their household, even if it was on what was coming to be known as the granny-flat principle.
1968J. Hudson Case of Need iii. i. 171 She had a flower painted on her cheek, and large, blue-tinted *granny glasses. 1970Guardian 22 June 1/1 A mop-headed youth with granny glasses.
1965J. Hart File for Death iv. 31 The girl, dressed in a long *granny gown and wearing a bright pink hairnet.
1880*Granny hat [see granny collarette above]. 1967Boston Sunday Globe 23 Apr. A 28/3 These favorites will be offered along with the teens' ‘granny hats’.
1905Eng. Dial. Dict. Suppl., Granny-knot. 1932Kipling Limits & Renewals 196 They'd been busy since light unpickin' the wire granny-knots this so-called Noo Navy had tied 'em in with. 1959Listener 7 May 808/2 The bag..that took half an hour to rope up with eighteen feet of clothes-line and about forty granny-knots.
1897Daily News 23 Jan. 6/3 The *Granny-muffs have been found to be really less warm.
1961Sunday Express 28 May 15/2 Small black-on-grey ‘*Granny’ prints.
1867Smyth Sailor's Word-bk., *Granny's bend, the slippery hitch made by a lubber.
1966H. Yoxall Fashion of Life viii. 76 In the autumn of 1965..girls in Los Angeles started a fad for wearing ‘*granny’ skirts, down to their heels.
1853Thoreau Jrnl. 25 July in Writings (1906) XI. 335, I had been all the while tying what is called a *granny's knot. c1860H. Stuart Seaman's Catech. 1 This knot..will not jam as a ‘granny's’ knot would do. 1867Smyth Sailor's Word-bk., Granny's knot, a term of derision when a reef-knot is crossed the wrong way, so as to be insecure. It is the natural knot tied by women or landsmen, and derided by seamen because it cannot be untied when it is jammed.
1863Phytologist New Ser. VI. 416 The Caltha palustris is called ‘May⁓blobs’ by the children who gather the flower in the meadows near Warwick; they also call the Wood Anemone (A. nemorosa) ‘*Granny's Nightcap’. 1892C. M. Yonge Old Woman's Outlook 119 The odd red-calyxed Geum rivale, called by the village children Granny's nightcaps. 1893Dartnell & Goddard Gloss. Wilts. 69 Granny (or Granny's) Nightcap, (1) Anemone nemorosa,..Wood Anemone..(2) Aquilegia vulgaris,..Common Columbine..(3) Convolvulus sepium,..Great Bindweed..(4) Convolvulus arvensis,..Field Bindweed.
Hence ˈgranny v., U.S. local, trans., to act as a ‘granny’ (sense 2) to.
1897R. M. Stuart In Simpkinsville 85 She grannied yore mother when you was born.
Add:[7.] granny annexe = granny flat, esp. one detached from the principal residence; cf. *grannex n.
1973Country Life 14 June (Suppl.) 34/2 (Advt.), New country property... ‘*Granny Annexe’ of 3 rooms, kitchen and cloakroom. 1985Newbury Weekly News 19 Dec. 29/7 Permission was granted..for a granny annexe and games room.
▸ granny dumping n. colloq. (chiefly U.S.) the abandonment of an elderly person in a public place such as a hospital or nursing home, esp. by a relative who is unable or unwilling to provide or pay for his or her care.
1987Times 8 Apr. 3/3 Delegates also expressed their concern about ‘*granny dumping’... ‘Vulnerable old people are rushed into hospital and regarded as unwanted parcels with no pre-planning for appropriate placing in longer-term care.’ 1995Irish Times (Nexis) 30 Jan. 12 ‘Granny dumping’ in casualty and acute hospital wards..was a symptom of a ‘crisis in the elderly care services’. 2000D. Mosler & B. Catley Global Amer. 75 The lack of services for the poor, the mentally ill,..the homeless, and the elderly creates a sense of general alienation. This results in social pathologies such as ‘granny dumping’—leaving infirm people at public hospitals and abandoning them to an uncertain future in the under-funded public health system.
▸ granny-sit v. (intr.) to look after an elderly person in the absence of his or her usual carers.
1979Washington Post 15 Nov. f5/5 The children also should be expected to do more than *granny-sit. 1997Independent (Nexis) 7 Dec. 4 Baby-sit or granny-sit so someone else can get out of the house.
▸ granny-sitter n. a person who is engaged to look after an elderly person in the absence of his or her usual carers.
1985New Age Summer 19/3 They might have welcomed information about..a voluntary *granny-sitter service. 1997Guardian (Nexis) 17 July 7 Ms Thompson points out that other members make arrangements for babysitters... She used to arrange a ‘grannysitter’ for her mother who recently died, aged 91.
▸ granny-sitting n. the task of looking after an elderly person in the absence of his or her usual carers; an instance of this.
1980J. S. Siegel in Demography 17 355/1 Some incentives, such as tax rebates, and other social ‘supports’, such as more gerontic day-care centers and ‘*granny sitting’ arrangements, will be needed. 1997Canberra Times (Nexis) 28 Dec. a22 Although the Gunning-Yass group now only has about 20 members, the trades and services are wide-ranging: astrology and tarot-card reading to babysitting, cooking to house, pet or granny sitting. |