Word of the Day

: December 31, 2008

zany

noun ZAY-nee

What It Means

1 : a subordinate clown or acrobat in old comedies who mimics ludicrously the tricks of the principal

2 : one who acts the buffoon to amuse others

3 : a foolish, eccentric, or crazy person

zany in Context

My brother's friends are an unpredictable bunch of zanies.

Did You Know?

Zanies have been theatrical buffoons since the heyday of the Italian commedia dell’arte, which introduced those knavish clowns. The Italian "zanni" was a stock servant character, often an intelligent and proud valet with abundant common sense, a love of practical jokes, and a tendency to be quarrelsome, cowardly, envious, vindictive, and treacherous. Zanni, the Italian name for the character, comes from a dialect nickname for Giovanni, the Italian form of John. The character quickly spread throughout European theater circles, inspiring such familiar characters as Pierrot and Harlequin, and by the late 1500s an anglicized version of the noun “zany” was introduced to English-speaking audiences by no less a playwright than William Shakespeare (in Loveas Labouras Lost).