gaiety
Americannoun
-
gaieties
plural
-
the state of being joyous, vivacious, or cheerful.
- Synonyms:
- joviality, cheerfulness, vivacity, hilarity, sportiveness, liveliness, joyousness, jollity, glee, mirth, merriment
- Antonyms:
- sadness
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Often gaieties. merrymaking or festivity.
the gaieties of the New Year season.
-
gaiety of dress.
- Synonyms:
- gaudiness, flashiness, glitter, brilliance
noun
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the state or condition of being merry, bright, or lively
-
festivity; merrymaking
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of gaiety
Explanation
A festive, happy event, like a big summer backyard party, will be full of gaiety — or merriment and playfulness. The noun gaiety is the feeling of happiness and delight that might be present at a child's birthday party or a festive square dance. Gaiety can describe a person's generally joyful personality, or the sound of laughter in your house. It comes from the French word gaieté, "joy, merriment, lightheartedness," which evolved from gai, "charming, joyful, happy." The word can be correctly spelled gaiety or gayety, although the first spelling is much more common.
Vocabulary lists containing gaiety
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
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Words for the International Day of Happiness
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The Picture of Dorian Gray
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The general gaiety of the show doesn’t mean the photos here are slight.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 19, 2025
Just seven blocks over and five blocks up from where the shell casings hit the sidewalk, they gathered for gaiety in a glitzy ballroom.
From Slate ● Mar. 3, 2025
Beneath the gaiety and carousing ran an undercurrent of anguish: The country remains locked in a ferocious war with Russia.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 15, 2023
Where the drops are sparse in detail, the frame delivers in an undeniable elegance and gaiety.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 7, 2023
Beneath the gaudy gaiety of the show, the bright lights, and the lazy laughter, he felt something sullen and dangerous.
From "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers
A Kennedy campaign always had the hereweareagain gaieties, that Irish quality of politics as frolic, overlaid with a unique elegance and a ruthlessness that advanced upon you with the brightest of teeth.
From Time Magazine Archive
The enchantment of the terrace operates suddenly to make these people's glib and pessimistic gaieties, when turned to a parody of the past, rekindle its most significant moments.
From Time Magazine Archive
Encouraged by the shouts, cheery or derisive, of Provincetown's Portuguese fishermen, the fleet then set out across Massachusetts Bay for Marblehead, for the first formal gaieties of the cruise.
From Time Magazine Archive
The idea of a sort of highborn Oxford, circa 1900, fits the play's alfresco gaieties, elaborate forms, donnish humor and prankish but decorous lovemaking.
From Time Magazine Archive
Her Majesty must also have been aware that comments to the same effect were current in general society, where the accustomed gaieties of the Court remained at a standstill.
From Queen Victoria As I Knew Her by Sir Theodore Martin
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
