gewgaw
Americannoun
noun
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of gewgaw
First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English giuegaue; gradational compound of uncertain origin; perhaps akin to Middle French, French gogo (see (à) gogo )
Explanation
A gewgaw is a little ornament or piece of jewelry. Gewgaws are cheap and don't have any purpose besides decoration. Gewgaws, which go on clothing or are worn as jewelry, are small and ornamental little bits of decoration. They’re not valuable or useful. A diamond would never be considered a gewgaw, because it's so precious. Gewgaws are good for brightening up an outfit. Pieces of jewelry, especially when they're flashy and cheap, can be called gewgaws. The silly sound of this word is a reminder that gewgaws are insubstantial. A gewgaw can also be called a bauble, novelty, or trinket.
Vocabulary lists containing gewgaw
Among the Hidden
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Walden
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Grendel
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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.
This apparent stance toward art is at once moronic and apt; moronic because it reduces art to a mere gewgaw, apt because other entrepreneurs have already embraced this view.
From New York Times ● Dec. 1, 2021
The nihilistic gewgaw, vacuous and vulgar, instead embodies the mythos that can be manufactured in a crude market-culture that primarily values art as a luxury asset.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 23, 2019
A few years ago, apparently based on some agreement that Americans were seriously lacking monograms, retailers decided that any gewgaw that could be mailed, toted or gifted was worthy of an emphatic initial or three.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 11, 2015
Chances are your ancestors ordered an extra gewgaw or two from the Sears catalog.
From Slate ● Dec. 23, 2014
Handsome settlements, and a chariot, that tempting gewgaw to the vanity of the middling class of females, were the least that she proposed to herself.
From Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady — Volume 9 by Samuel Richardson
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.
