Etymology

tomfoolery

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Today it means: Foolish behaviour or speech. Full definition →

English foolery ← Middle English Thomme ← Latin Thōmās
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The story

  1. Aramaicתאמא
  2. Aramaicתאומא (təʾōmā)
  3. Ancient GreekΘωμᾶς (Thōmâs)
  4. LatinThōmās
  5. Middle EnglishThomas
  6. Middle EnglishThomme
  7. EnglishTom
  8. Englishfoolery
  9. English todaytomfoolery

From Tom (“a common man”) + foolery.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.