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Definition of popinjay - 4 dictionary results

pop⋅in⋅jay

  [pop-in-jey]
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–noun
1. a person given to vain, pretentious displays and empty chatter; coxcomb; fop.
2. British Dialect. a woodpecker, esp. the green woodpecker.
3. Archaic. the figure of a parrot usually fixed on a pole and used as a target in archery and gun shooting.
4. Archaic. a parrot.
Origin:
1275–1325; ME papejay, popingay, papinjai(e) < MF papegai, papingay parrot < Sp papagayo < Ar bab(ba)ghā'
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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pop·in·jay   (pŏp'ĭn-jā')   
n.  A vain, talkative person.

[Middle English, parrot, from Old French papegai, from Spanish papagayo or Old Provençal papagai, both from Arabic babġā', babaġā', from Persian babbaghā.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Popinjay

Pop"in*jay\, n. [OE. popingay, papejay, OF. papegai, papegaut; cf. Pr. papagai, Sp. & Pg. papagayo, It. pappagallo, LGr. ?, NGr. ?; in which the first syllables are perhaps imitative of the bird's chatter, and the last either fr. L. gallus cock, or the same word as E. jay, F. geai. Cf. Papagay.]

1. (Zo["o]l.) (a) The green woodpecker. (b) A parrot.

The pye and popyngay speak they know not what. --Tyndale.

2. A target in the form of a parrot. [Scot.]

3. A trifling, chattering, fop or coxcomb. "To be so pestered with a popinjay." --Shak.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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popinjay 
1270, "a parrot," from O.Fr. papegai (12c.), from Sp. papagayo, from Ar. babagha', from Pers. babgha "parrot," possibly imitative of its cry. Used of people in a complimentary sense (in allusion to beauty and rarity) from c.1310; meaning "vain, talkative person" is first recorded 1528. Obsolete fig. sense of "a target to shoot at" is explained by Cotgrave's 2nd sense definition: "also a woodden parrot (set up on the top of a steeple, high tree, or pole) whereat there is, in many parts of France, a generall shooting once euerie yeare; and an exemption, for all that yeare, from La Taille, obtained by him that strikes downe" all or part of the bird.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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