4 November 2014

droll

[drohl]

adjective, droller, drollest.
1. amusing in an odd way; whimsically humorous; waggish.
noun
2. a droll person; jester; wag.
verb (used without object)
3. Archaic. to jest; joke.

Origin
Middle French, Middle Dutch
1615-1625; < Middle French drolle pleasant rascal < Middle Dutch drol a fat little man

Related forms
drollness, noun
drolly, adverb

Synonyms
1. diverting, odd, witty. See amusing. 2, 3. clown.

Antonyms
1. serious.
Dictionary.com

Examples from the web for droll
– The collage-and-paint illustrations of the mice are droll.
– It’s a kid’s book, but extremely charming and droll.
– So is their droll, devil-may-care inventiveness.

Today’s aphorism

Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.

– Mark Twain (accredited but not verified)

On this day

4 November 1926 – British archeologist, Howard Carter, discovers steps leading to the tomb of the Pharoah Tutankhamen.

4 November 1979 – Students loyal to the Ayatollah Khomeini over-run the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and take 90 Americans hostage in protest against the former Shah of Iran being allowed into the U.S. for medical treatment. The hostages were held for 14 months and released after the U.S. government promised $5 billion in foreign aid and unfroze $3 billion of Iranian funds. During the crisis, President Jimmy Carter attempted an unsuccessful rescue mission by helicopter, which ended in the deaths of 8 U.S. marines.

4 November 1995 – assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The assassin was Yigal Amir, an Israeli right-wing Zionist, who opposed the signing of the Oslo Peace Accords in which Rabin had negotiated a peace plan with the Palestinian Liberation Organisation.