English Explanatory Dictionary

motley

English dictionary entry

Meanings

adj
  1. Comprising greatly varied elements, to the point of incongruity.
  2. Having many colours; variegated.
noun
  1. An incongruous mixture.
  2. A jester's multicoloured clothes.
  3. A jester; a fool.
verb
  1. To give something a patchwork appearance.
  2. To make something multicolored, variegated, or diverse in character.
name
  1. A surname.
  2. A city in Morrison County and Cass County, Minnesota, United States.

Pronunciation

/ˈmɒtli/ LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-motley.wav /ˈmɑtli/

Word forms

motley more motley motlier motleyer most motley motliest motleyest motleys motleying motleyed

Etymology

From Middle English motle, from Anglo-Norman motteley (“parti-colored”), from Old English mot (“speck”). Doublet of mote. The English word can be analysed as mottle + -y.

Synonyms

heterogeneous diverse manifold catholic dishomogeneous diversified eclectic liberal miscellaneous mixed motley multifarious multifold sundry variable varied various colorful prismatic variegated aurora-colored (US) / aurora-coloured colorful (US) / colourful colorific discolored [⇒ thesaurus] (US obsolete) / discoloured kaleidoscopic many-coloured multichromatic multicolor (US) / multicolour multicolored (US) / multicoloured multicolorous multihued particolored (US) / particoloured polychromate polychromatic polychromed polyhued rainbow rainbow-colored (US) / rainbow-coloured tissued

Related words

mottled

Derived words

motley crew motley fool motley iron motleyness Motley County
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
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