any of various composite plants the flowers of which have a yellow disk and white rays, as the English daisy and the oxeye daisy.
Also called daisy ham. a small section of pork shoulder, usually smoked, boned, and weighing from two to four pounds.
Slang. someone or something of first-rate quality.
That new car is a daisy.
a cheddar cheese of cylindrical shape, weighing about 20 pounds.
a small low-growing European plant, Bellis perennis, having a rosette of leaves and flower heads of yellow central disc flowers and pinkish-white outer ray flowers: family Asteraceae (composites)
Also called: oxeye daisy. marguerite. moon daisy. a Eurasian composite plant, Leucanthemum vulgare having flower heads with a yellow centre and white outer rays
any of various other composite plants having conspicuous ray flowers, such as the Michaelmas daisy and Shasta daisy
slang an excellent person or thing
dead and buried
before 1000; Middle English dayesye, Old English dægesēge the day's eye
A daisy is a cheerful white flower with yellow in the center. Drive through the countryside in mid-summer and you can often see whole fields full of daisies. Daisies grow wild in many places, and they're also cultivated in gardens as a perennial, a plant that returns year after year. One invasive variation is called a "lawn daisy" because it quickly and easily takes over grassy lawns and is notoriously hard to mow down. The word daisy comes from day's eye, an informal name that arose from the flower's habit of closing its petals when the sun goes down at the end of the day.
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
DAISY: I ain't tried to break 'em up.
From The Mule-Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts by Hurston, Zora Neale
"DAISY" The top picture shows a pure, winsome girl of fourteen going to school in a little country town.
From Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls or, War on the White Slave Trade by Bell, Ernest A. (Ernest Albert)
DAISY: Look here, baby, at this new step I learned up North.
From The Mule-Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts by Hurston, Zora Neale
DAISY: I ain't thinking 'bout goin' home yet.
From The Mule-Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts by Hurston, Zora Neale
DAISY: You always was a nice quiet boy, Jim.
From The Mule-Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts by Hurston, Zora Neale
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
