hurly-burly
Americannoun
adjective
noun
adjective
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of hurly-burly
1520–30; alteration of hurling ( and ) burling, rhyming phrase based on hurling in its (now obsolete) sense of tumult, uproar
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:
Mr. Howard observes that his preference for country living distinguished him in the book world, and he spent a lot of his adult life in small-town Connecticut, serenely removed from the urban hurly-burly.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 7, 2025
Yet by 2021’s “Solar Power,” Lorde was singing about abandoning the hurly-burly of pop stardom in the always-on social-media era.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 2, 2025
In a normal election year, races for secretary of state are sleepy affairs, and their campaigns struggle for media coverage amid the hurly-burly of more prominent Senate, governor and House contests.
From New York Times ● Sep. 22, 2022
The petite 20-year-old has carved out a small patch of influence in the male-dominated hurly-burly of Kenyan politics, in the informal settlement of Kibra in the capital, Nairobi, where she lives.
From BBC ● Jun. 24, 2022
Standing on Beacon Hill, so far removed from the hurly-burly of the wharves, shops, markets of town, Johnny hesitated.
From "Johnny Tremain" by Esther Hoskins Forbes
How many several hurly-burlies of fools! for I myself sometimes sit among those poetical gods.
From The Praise of Folly by Wilson, John
King looks towards the Prince of Baireuth again, agreed on before those hurly-burlies now past; Queen looks far otherwards.
From History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 08 by Carlyle, Thomas
I hope the soldiers of Capua shall follow our faction, for Sylla, hearing of these hurly-burlies, is hasting homeward, very fortunate in his wars against Mithridates.
From A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 7 by Various
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.
