fuddy-duddy
Americannoun
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fuddy-duddies
plural
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a person who is stuffy, old-fashioned, and conservative.
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a person who is fussy or picayune about details; fussbudget.
adjective
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stuffy, old-fashioned, and conservative.
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fussy; picayune.
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of fuddy-duddy
First recorded in 1900–05; of obscure origin
Explanation
An old-fashioned, fussy person can be called a fuddy-duddy. You might accuse your best friend of being a fuddy-duddy if she prefers staying home drinking tea and reading on Saturday nights, instead of going dancing with you. A fuddy-duddy has no sense of humor and is disapproving and a bit pompous. Fuddy-duddies seem dull and conservative, overly careful, and critical of other people's decisions. While we know fuddy-duddy first appeared in print in the late 1800s, and that it originated in the United States, its origin is a mystery.
Vocabulary lists containing fuddy-duddy
O'Reilly's Lexicon of Epithets
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A Wind in the Door
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Bob Newhart (1929–2024) Tribute List
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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:
And not to be a fuddy-duddy, but I can think of many better uses, including using that desire to connect with people to motivate charity work, political organizing, or just throwing a dinner party.
From Salon ● Jan. 19, 2025
Richard Martin says: "It was the 60s, the government wanted to be modern and thrusting, it wanted to get rid of old fuddy-duddy stuff."
From BBC ● Jan. 29, 2023
Second comes the flash of unexpected delight — surprise that an old fuddy-duddy cocktail your grandparents drank could taste so good.
From New York Times ● Feb. 24, 2022
She designed the spirit to pique curiosity of younger drinkers who think of genever as too fuddy-duddy, she told me.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 18, 2021
Peacock But, I don't propose to marry my daughter to some old fuddy-duddy.
From La Tontine by Alain René Le Sage
We tend to think of people from long ago as credulous, unsophisticated fuddy-duddies.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 13, 2021
If those sessions were going on with a bunch of fuddy-duddies they wouldn’t be getting such good results.”
From The Guardian ● Jan. 10, 2016
Word-centric fuddy-duddies see the decline of literacy reflected in their heart-shaped eyes, while guardians of decorum lament the spread of greasy kid stuff dripping from the characters’ snail trails.
From New York Times ● Apr. 3, 2015
For self-consciously “edgy” believers, there’s Bad Christian, in which a pastor and two musicians razz each other and blast the fuddy-duddies who don’t get it.
From Slate ● Dec. 14, 2014
Professional men ranging from retired fuddy-duddies, applying their waning financial talents to the diversion of philanthropy, to corporation heads, prominent legal advisors and medical geniuses renowned for their taciturnity—these came for Mrs. Gilchrist.
From Gargoyles by Ben Hecht
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.
