Etymologically
Log in

daisy

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 22 October 2026 at 21:33. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈdeɪ.zi/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English dayesye (also daiseie),[2][3][4] inherited from Old English dæġes ēaġe (“day's eye”), contracted dæġesēġe,[3][4][5] from dæġes, genitive of dæġ (“day”), and ēaġe (“eye”).[5][6][7] The flower closes its white petals over the yellow disc in the evening and opens them again in the morning, like an eye.[6][8][9][10] Skeat preferred to take the "eye of day" as the sun, which the flower resembles.[2] In Medieval Latin the flower was called Medieval Latin solis oculus (“sun's eye”).[7][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The common daisy, Bellis perennis: Old English, in Ælfric's Glossary of about 1000.[4][6] The Middle English form daiseie is dated before 1300, and the surname Dayeseye 1281.[4][7]

Semantic evolution

Chaucer explained the name in the Legend of Good Women: "Men by resoun wel it calle may / The dayesie, or elles the ye of day".[11] From the early 15th century dais eye was also used for the sun.[7] The name passed to other flowers of the same family: in North America to the ox-eye daisy (1785), and elsewhere to other composite plants.[6][7] Between about 1485 and 1605 daisy was a term of admiration or endearment for a person;[6][12] from 1757 (in Samuel Foote) slang, chiefly American, used it for a first-rate person or thing, and also as an adjective.[6][13] Johnson (1755) called it simply "a spring-flower", quoting Shakespeare's "When daisies pied, and violets blue".[14] Phrases about the dead lying under the daisies or pushing up daisies date from the mid-19th century (1842 in the OED).[15][6] In 18th-century criminal slang a daisy was a diamond.[13]

Timeline

  • Old English (about 1000) – the common daisy.[4][6]
  • 1281 – the surname Dayeseye.[4]
  • early 15th century – dais eye, the sun.[7]
  • c. 1485–1605 – a term of admiration for a person.[6]
  • 1757 – (slang) a first-rate person or thing.[6][13]
  • 1767 – verb, to cover with daisies.[6]
  • 1785 – applied in North America to the ox-eye daisy.[6]
  • 1842 – under the daisies, dead and buried.[6]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A small European plant, Bellis perennis, with flower heads of white or pinkish petals round a yellow centre, common in lawns.
  2. Any of various other plants of the aster family with similar flowers, such as the ox-eye daisy.
  3. (dated slang) A first-rate or excellent person or thing.

Word family

  • daisied
  • daisy wheel
  • daisy chain
  • day
  • eye
  • marguerite

Usage notes

As a girl's name Daisy was originally a pet form of Margaret, because French marguerite also means "daisy".[16] The idiom fresh as a daisy is listed in the Shorter Oxford.[17] In Scots and other dialects a daisy-cutter was a horse that trotted with its feet close to the ground, and Weekley notes the later use in cricket for a ball that keeps low.[18][11]

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  3. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  10. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
  11. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  12. ^ Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
  13. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  15. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  16. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  17. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  18. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)