name, noun, slang ·Common ·High school level
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"Although sympathetic, my main reaction was to think: “Some people can handle it, and some people can’t,” and then smugly light up a big fat jay."
"They are the commonality of birddom, who furnish forth the mobs which bewilder the drunken-flighted jay when he jerks, shrieking in a series of blue hyphen-flashes through the air […]"
"Burlington Bertie's the latest young jay He rents a swell flat somewhere Kensington way He spends the good oof that his pater has made Along with the Brandy and Soda Brigade."
"Some jay of Italy, / Whose mother was her painting, hath betray'd him:"
"“I started to think about it. He’s coming in on a two-seater experimental plane to pitch me to go on a five-seater experimental sub that he has built down to the ocean floor to see the Titanic,” Jay said."
"To Lt. and Mrs. John Ellingston (Beth Vollstedt), a daughter, Jay Karen, on September 17, 1945."
"Jay picked up the old scissors."
Any of the numerous species of birds belonging to several genera within the family Corvidae, including Garrulus, Cyanocitta, Aphelocoma, Perisoreus, Cyanocorax, Gymnorhinus, Cyanolyca, Ptilostomus, and Calocitta, allied to the crows, but smaller, more graceful in form, often handsomely coloured, usually having a crest, and often noisy.
Common synonyms include: alphabetic character j, big talker, blab, blue jay, bluejay, bumpkin.
Jay picked up the old scissors.
Pronounced /ˈd͡ʒeɪ/.
From Middle English jay, from Old French jai ("jay"; Modern French geai), either from Late Latin gaius (“jay”), or from Old French gai (“gay, merry”), so named due to its plumage, from Old Frankish *gāhi (“quick, impetuous”), from Proto-Germanic *ganhuz, *ganhwaz (“sudden”), cognate with Dutch gaai (“jay”). More at gay.
Respelling of the letter jy (which see), by analogy with the following letter kay.
Borrowed from Hindi जय (jay, literally “victory”).