Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Informal A grandmother.
  • noun Informal A fussy person.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A grandmother; an old woman.
  • noun A duck, the south-southerly or old-wife. More fully, old granny.
  • noun A nurse or midwife.
  • To serve as a nurse or midwife.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A grandmother; a grandam; familiarly, an old woman.
  • noun (Naut.) a kind of insecure knot or hitch; a reef knot crossed the wrong way.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun colloquial A grandmother.
  • noun colloquial, derogatory An elderly woman.
  • adjective typically or stereotypically old-fashioned, especially in clothing and accessories worn by or associated with elderly women.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the mother of your father or mother
  • noun a reef knot crossed the wrong way and therefore insecure
  • noun an old woman

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for grandmother or grandam.]

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Examples

Comments

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  • "Instead of answering she unexpectedly placed her hand on my midriff and smiled that small and all-knowing smile that grandmothers seem to learn at granny school, along with crochet, January sales battle tactics and wondering what you are doing upstairs."

    - Jasper Fforde, 'Lost In A Good Book'.

    November 24, 2008

  • A one-sided Scrabble match, so called because even your granny couldn't lose. Also known as a blowout or a no-brainer.

    November 27, 2019

  • I don't know...my grandma was known for decisively crushing all comers in Scrabble. One time I tied with her and it was one of the proudest moments of my adolescence

    November 27, 2019