drollery means comical quality. It carries an Arena rating of 1514, earned across 4 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, drollery ranks #2,309 of 14,431 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound, #2,374 of 14,451 for Most Whimsical Words, #2,574 of 14,448 for Funniest Words, #7,100 of 14,440 for Most Satisfying to Say.
drollery is pronounced /ˈdɹəʊləɹi/.
Why “drollery” is a great word
The quality of being amusingly odd or whimsically humorous. From French drôlerie, from drôle (“odd, amusing, funny”) + -erie (a suffix forming nouns denoting a quality or practice), the word entered English around 1590–1600. Unlike wit, which cuts with intellectual precision, or farce, which blusters with situational excess, drollery resides in a quieter, more peculiar register. It is the humor of a garden gnome posed as a philosopher, the unexpected gravitas of a cat in a miniature hat, or the perfectly delivered, nonsensical aside in an otherwise solemn conversation—a gentle testament to the world’s inherent, comforting absurdity.
Etymology
From French drôlerie, from drôle + -erie; equivalent to droll + -ery.
noun
- Comical quality.“He found that Sally had a restrained, but keen, sense of the ridiculous, and she made remarks about the girls or the men who were set over them which amused him by their unexpected drollery.”
- Amusing behavior.
- Something humorous, funny or comical.“"I'm pregnant."
"No drolleries this morning please."
"Three months."”
- A puppet show; a comic play or entertainment; a comic picture; a caricature.“Sebastian: A liuing Drolerie : now I will beleeue
That there are Vnicornes : that in Arabia
There is one Tree, the Phœnix throne, one Phœnix
At this houre reigning there.”
- A joke; a funny story.
- A small decorative image in the margin of an illuminated manuscript.
Words closest in meaning
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