gewgaw

plural gewgaws · alternative geegaw · alternative gew-gaw · alternative gee-gaw

1. A showy trifle, a toy; a showy trinket, ornament or decoration.First known use 15th c.

   A heavy gewgaw called a crown.

   1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Tenth Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […] Together with the Satires of Aulus Persius Flaccus. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC

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   It was a Saxon ornament. […] Some Puritan, before his departure, may have thought himself doing God service by filching the old golden gewgaw.

   1883, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 15, in Doctor Grimshawe's Secret

   “I am not of the neighbourhood,” said Mallow, calmly, “but the matter is irrelevant. I have had the honour to send you a little gift yesterday ——” [¶] The tech-man’s nose lifted. “I received it. An interesting gewgaw. I may have use for it on occasion.” [¶] I have other and more interesting gifts. Quite out of the gewgaw stage.”

   1951, Isaac Asimov, Foundation (1974 Panther Books Ltd publication), part V: “The Merchant Princes”, chapter 11, page 163, ¶¶ 2–4

   [Virtue] is a gewgaw to hang up in a display-case, or to have dangling from your tongue just as an earring dangles from your ear.

   2004 [1595], Michel de Montaigne, “On Cato the Younger”, in M. A. Screech, transl., The Complete Essays (Penguin Classic), translation of Essais (in French), page 430

   You or I may well view our desire to push buttons and order new electronic gewgaws as the mere reflex spasms of consumerism, but to this dynamic duo the future of the earth depends on our instant gratification more than anything else.

   2011, Will Self, “The frowniest spot on Earth”, in London Review of Books, XXXIII.9

alternative geegaw · alternative gew-gaw · alternative gee-gaw

1. not comparableShowy; unreal; pretentious.

   Seeing his gewgaw castle shine, New as his title, built last year.

   1855, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Maud; A Monodrama, X, stanza 1

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   The rattle of a globe to play withal, This gewgaw world, and put him cheaply off;

   1678, Dryden, John, All for Love, Scene II

   Synonyms: gewgawish