Nearby Words
adjective
1.
irritating; damned; confounded: Get that darned bicycle out of the driveway!
adverb
2.
very; extremely; remarkably: She's a darned good tennis player.
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Darned
is always a great word to know.
So is doohickey. Does it mean:
| a gadget; dingus; thingumbob. |
| a screen or mat covered with a dark material for shielding a camera lens from excess light or glare. |
Origin:
1800–10; euphemism for damned, perhaps by construing dern dark, dreary (now obsolete) as an intensifier in phrases such as dern and dreary, dern and doleful
1800–10; euphemism for damned, perhaps by construing dern dark, dreary (now obsolete) as an intensifier in phrases such as dern and dreary, dern and doleful
Related forms
un·darned, adjective
well-darned, adjective
Dictionary.com Unabridged
verb (used with object)
1.
to mend, as torn clothing, with rows of stitches, sometimes by crossing and interweaving rows to span a gap.
noun
2.
a darned place, as in a garment: an old sock full of darns.
Origin:
1590–1600; perhaps to be identified with Middle English dernen to keep secret, conceal, Old English (Anglian) dernan
1590–1600; perhaps to be identified with Middle English dernen to keep secret, conceal, Old English (Anglian) dernan
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
Cite This Source
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Link To Darned
Collins
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Cite This Source
Etymonline
Word Origin & History
darn
tame curse word, 1781, Amer.Eng. euphemism for damn, said to have originated in New England when swearing was a punishable offense; if so, its spread was probably infl. by 'tarnal, short for Eternal, as in By the Eternal (God), favorite exclamation of Andrew Jackson, among
EXPAND others. Related: Darndest (superl., 1844).
COLLAPSE
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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