Origin: before 1000; late Middle English (Scots ) brydgrome, alteration of Middle English bridegome,Old English brȳdguma (brȳdbride1 + guma man, cognate with Latin homō), with final element conformed to groom
a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.
a fool or simpleton; ninny.
a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
an arrangement of five objects, as trees, in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.
[C14: changed (through influence of groom) from Old English brӯdguma, from brӯdbride1 + guma man; related to Old Norse brūthgumi, Old High German brūtigomo]
O.E. brydguma "suitor," from bryd "bride" (see bride) + guma "man" (cf. O.N. gumi, O.H.G. gomo, cognate with L. homo "man"). Ending altered 16c. by folk etymology after groom "groom, boy, lad" (q.v.). Common Germanic compound (cf. O.S. brudigumo,