verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb

1. 1
   To equivocate; to dodge the issue. dialectal, obsolete

   "Considerable time was taken up in skirmishing and pollyfoxing to secure the advantage in the start."

Synonyms

All synonyms

pussyfoot

Example

More examples

"Considerable time was taken up in skirmishing and pollyfoxing to secure the advantage in the start."

Etymology

Attested since 1860s. Unknown etymology - a column in a 1921 issue of The Weekly Review speculated it might be an eponym.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.