golly

«golly» in Mova's school dictionary: an exclamation of surprise, delight or shock, used… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 1 sentence of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

exclamation (golly!; also «golly gosh», «good golly»)

meaning for a pupil

1) (mild, old-fashioned) an exclamation of surprise, delight or shock, used instead of swearing or saying God. tree →

2) (childish or humorous) used for fun to sound innocent. tree →

sense in the lessons

A gentle stand-in for «God», now old-fashioned and often funny; used by grandparents, in children's books and cartoons. UK and US.

examples

• Golly, that's a big cake! tree →
• Golly, I didn't know you could juggle. tree →
• "Good golly!" said the old professor. tree →
• Golly gosh, look at the time! tree →
• The children in the old adventure book keep saying "golly". tree →
• Golly, it's cold this morning. tree →
• "Golly, thanks!" said the little boy. tree →
• People say "golly" when they're surprised but don't want to swear. tree →

note

Trap: it is not rude at all; it just sounds old-fashioned. Plain meaning: «wow!»

In the corpora

• "Golly" is an old-fashioned mild word used instead of "God".

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «golly» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.