bonny
Americanadjective
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Chiefly Scot. pleasing to the eye; handsome; pretty.
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British Dialect.
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(of people) healthy, sweet, and lively.
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(of places) placid; tranquil.
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pleasing; agreeable; good.
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adverb
noun
adjective
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dialect beautiful or handsome
a bonny lass
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merry or lively
a bonny family
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good or fine
a bonny house
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(esp of babies) plump
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dialect considerable; to be reckoned with
cost a bonny penny
adverb
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of bonny
1425–75; late Middle English ( Scots ) bonie, perhaps < Old French bon good + -ie -y 1, perhaps by analogy with jolie jolly
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:
And Coach Kliff Kingsbury, the bonny prince plucked from Texas Tech in 2019, was scheduled to receive his comeuppance by now.
From New York Times ● Oct. 6, 2021
Tara Erraught is a bonny Irish lass who is almost aggressively likable.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 10, 2018
Basically, Claire pulls the 18th century equivalent of a #yesallwomen campaign, and celebrates her victory by standing on a buttress and smiling vacantly at some wee bonny children.
From Time ● Aug. 16, 2014
"You're a bonny fellow to frighten children so," one of the regulars admonished him as he finished the tale.
From BBC ● Jul. 25, 2014
“Not at all—it bears the most gracious message in the world: for the rest, you are not my conscience-keeper, so don’t make yourself uneasy. Here, come in, bonny wanderer!”
From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
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Vincenzo Italiano's players held their nerve better in the shoot-out, with Alessandro Bastoni, Nicolo Barella and Ange-Yoan Bonny all failing from the spot for Inter.
From Barron's ● Dec. 19, 2025
In light of the administration’s security strategy, the sale shows “its actions are aligning with its words,” said Bonny Lin, director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 19, 2025
Calvert walks with her daughter, Nancy Lingemann, on Lingemann’s property in Bonny Doon.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 29, 2025
Djerf Avenue's chief operating officer, Pernilla Bonny, said the company acknowledged the challenges in its workplace environment and had taken steps to address them.
From BBC ● Dec. 13, 2024
“Anne Bonny, Lady Killigrew, Grace O’Malley—to name only a few.”
From "The Hidden Gallery" by Maryrose Wood
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While some of his ban mots may have grown bonnier in telling, and others may be wholly apocryphal, who can say for sure?
From Time Magazine Archive
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“Not a bit, and you never will. You’ve grown bigger and bonnier, but you are the same scapegrace as ever.”
From "Little Women" by Louisa May Alcott
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“But look me fairly in the face; am I not bonnier than she?”
From The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) by Stevenson, Robert Louis
Cloud shadows were racing each other across the pastures as I lay back and watched them, and I thought the view had never been bonnier.
From Windyridge by Riley, W.
Allison was “coming to herself,” growing “like other folk,” only bonnier and better than most.
From Allison Bain, or, By a Way she knew not by Edwards, G. H. (George Henry)
The prams of Britain are filled with the bonniest babies in living memory.
From Time Magazine Archive
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So he suggested a cat instead, “the bonniest little cat ye ever did see.”
From "The Old Willis Place" by Mary Downing Hahn
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Out bespak the Earl of Hume, And O but he spak wondrous sorry,—30 "The bonniest lass about a' Glasgow toun, This day is awa wi' a hieland laddie."
From English and Scottish Ballads, Volume IV by Various
There is no stone to mark where he lies, but I know the spot, and I always think the gowan blinks bonniest and the grass grows greenest there.
From Aileen Aroon, A Memoir With other Tales of Faithful Friends and Favourites by Stables, Gordon
When Lord Fyvie this letter read, O dear, but he was sorry; 'The bonniest lass in Fyvie's land Is bewitched by Andrew Lammie.'
From The Romantic Scottish Ballads: Their Epoch and Authorship by Chambers, Robert W. (Robert William)
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.