monkey
Noun
- any of various long-tailed primates (excluding the prosimians)
- one who is playfully mischievous
- A member of the clade Simiiformes other than those in the clade Hominoidea containing apes, generally (but not universally) distinguished by small size, tails, and cheek pouches.
- Any simian including humans.
- Any simian primate other than hominids, any monkey or ape.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- A naughty or mischievous person, especially a child.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- The person in the motorcycle sidecar in sidecar racing.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- Synonym of idiot: a person of minimal intelligence.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- Synonym of uggo: an unattractive person, especially one whose face supposedly resembles a monkey's.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- Synonym of puppet: a person dancing to another's tune, a person controlled or directed by another.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- A menial employee who does a repetitive job supposedly requiring minimal intelligence.
- A human considered to resemble monkeys in some way, including:
- A black person.
- A penis.
- A small trading vessel of the sixteenth century.
- The vessel in which a mess receives its full allowance of grog.
- The weight of a pile driver or drop hammer.
- A fluid consisting of hydrochloric acid and zinc, used in the process of soldering.
- Synonym of five hundred, especially (British) 500 pounds sterling or (US, dated) 500 dollars.
- Synonym of face card.
- A person's temper, said to be "up" when they are angry.
- A drug habit; an addiction; a compulsion.
- A dance popularized by Major Lance in 1963, now usually only its upper-body dance move involving exaggerated drumming motions.
Verb
Verb Forms: monkeyed, monkeying, monkeys
- To mimic or imitate playfully.
- play around with or alter or falsify, usually secretively or dishonestly
- do random, unplanned work or activities or spend time idly
- To meddle; to mess (with).
- To mimic; to ape.
Examples
- Chimpanzees are known to form bands to hunt and kill other monkeys.
- code monkey
- Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey.
- grease monkey
- He had been visiting an area zoo when a monkey swung from its tree perch, swiped his glasses and hurled them into a hippo hole.
- He tried to MONKEY around with the letters, hoping a new word combination would appear in Scrabble.
- No, no, no, not you. I want to talk to the organ grinder, not the monkey.
- phone monkey
- Please don't monkey with the controls if you don't know what you're doing.
- Stop misbehaving, you cheeky little monkey!
Origin / Etymology
Uncertain. May be derived from monk + -ey (diminutive suffix), or borrowed from Middle Low German Moneke, the name of the son of Martin the Ape in Reynard the Fox (which may represent an unattested colloquial Middle Low German *moneke, *moneken), itself of uncertain origin. Possibly derived from a Romance term represented by Late Middle French monne (whence Modern French mone (“monkey”)) or earlier Old French monnekin (“monkey”), originally Monnekin, the name of a monkey in Li Dis d'Entendement. Compare also Old French and Middle French monin (“monkey”). The French terms may have been borrowed from Italian monna (“monkey”), from Old Spanish mona (“female monkey”), itself a shortening of mamona, variant of maimón, from Arabic مَيْمُون (maymūn, “baboon”)). However, Old French monnekin may alternatively be unrelated to the other terms, instead being a borrowing of Early Middle Dutch mannekin (a diminutive of a personal name or surname; hence, nickname, literally “miniature man”).
Synonyms
fiddle, imp, mess around, monkey around, muck about, muck around, potter, putter, rapscallion, rascal, scalawag, scallywag, scamp, tamper, tinker, face card, five hundred, idiot, interfere, monkey, puppet, uggo
Scrabble Score: 15
monkey: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordmonkey: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
monkey: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary