Meaning of Zany | Babel Free

Definitions

A fool or clown, especially one whose business on the stage is to imitate foolishly the actions of the principal clown.

archaic

Equivalents

Examples

“Then write that I may follow, and so be / Thy echo, thy debtor, thy foil, thy zany.”

“O great restorer of the good old stage, / Preacher at once, and Zany of thy age!”

“So there he caught me lying like a zany on the ground. You may guess I stood at attention soon enough, but told him I was looking at the founds to see if they wanted underpinning from the floods.”

“Part of the illusory world is the 'quack' or mountebank who can be seen standing on his own special platform in the centre of the crowd[…]. Such a person travelled round to fairs and markets selling his nostrums or medicines. This character is dressed in a lace hat, long periwig and embroidered coat with lace cuffs, and is attended by his zany, who is wearing a chequered harlequin outfit and is 'quacking' or 'puffing' his master's wares. No seventeenth- or eighteenth-century mountebank was complete without his zany or 'Merry Andrew' – a term originally applied to Dr Andrew Boorde, physician to Henry VIII and noted for his ready wit and humour, who was the subject of many broadside ballads.”

CEFR level