busy
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: enpr: bĭz'i
ipa: /ˈbɪzi/
rhymes: -ɪzi
Forms: form: busier
form: busiest
Etymology: From Middle English bisy, busie, from Old English bisiġ (“busy, occupied, diligent”), from Proto-West Germanic *bisīg (“diligent; zealous; busy”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian biesich (“active, diligent, hard-working, industrious”), Dutch bezig (“busy”), Low German besig (“busy”). The spelling with ⟨u⟩ represents the pronunciation of the West Midland and Southern dialects while the Modern English pronunciation with /ɪ/ is from the dialects of the East Midlands.
Senses: examples: text: Be careful crossing that busy street.
text: To-morrow is a busy day.
ref: c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]:
text: Although they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers passed and repassed; where shadowy carts and coaches battled for the way, and all the strife and tumult of a real city were.[…]They left the busy scene, and went into an obscure part of the town, where Scrooge had never penetrated before, although he recognised its situation, and its bad repute.
ref: 1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “(please specify the page number)”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC:
text: With hours to go before their labor contract expired, longshoremen on the East and Gulf Coasts prepared on Monday to go on strike at midnight, halting most activity at some of the busiest U.S. ports.
ref: 2024 September 30, Peter Eavis, “Counteroffers Exchanged in Effort to Avert U.S. Dock Strike”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 01 Oct 2024:
glosses: Crowded with business or activities; having a great deal going on.
examples: text: The director cannot see you now: he's busy.
text: Her telephone has been busy all day.
text: He is busy with piano practice.
text: Ramzi is busy getting ready for meetings.
text: Go away, I’m busy sleeping!
text: And the first thing I did was to lay by a certain quantity of provisions, being the stores for our voyage; and intended in a week or a fortnight’s time to open the dock, and launch out our boat. I was busy one morning upon something of this kind, when I called to Friday, and bid him to go to the sea-shore and see if he could find a turtle or a tortoise, a thing which we generally got once a week, for the sake of the eggs as well as the flesh.
But to return to Friday; he was so busy about his father that I could not find in my heart to take him off for some time; but after I thought he could leave him a little, I called him to me, and he came jumping and laughing, and pleased to the highest extreme: then I asked him if he had given his father any bread.
ref: 1719 May 6 (Gregorian calendar), [Daniel Defoe], The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC:
text: After walking several miles in a leisurely manner, and too busy to know anything about it, they found at last, on examining their watches, that it was time to be at home.
ref: 1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], Pride and Prejudice: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC:
text: His hands were busy with his garments all this time; turning them inside out, putting them on upside down, tearing them, mislaying them, making them parties to every kind of extravagance.
ref: 1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “(please specify the page number)”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC:
text: In fact she was so busy doing all the things that anyone might, who finds themselves alone in an empty house, that she did not notice at first when it began to turn dusk and the rooms to grow dim.
ref: 1967, Barbara Sleigh, Jessamy, Sevenoaks, Kent: Bloomsbury, published 1993, →ISBN, page 18:
text: These days, as people get busier and busier, many are skipping the tamale making and just cooking up this thick polentalike soup.
ref: 1997, Douglas Rodriguez, Latin ladles:
text: It may get even busier in town when a sleek train service called the Brightline debuts this summer, shuttling travelers between nearby West Palm Beach and Miami.
ref: 2017 March 1, Hannah Seligson, “Where to get hip in Palm Beach”, in CNN:
glosses: Engaged in activity or by someone else; bustling.
examples: text: Near-synonym: swamped
text: Finding the time to work out and cook healthy meals is easily pushed to the wayside in our ordinary, busy lives.
ref: 2015 June 19, Jennifer Cohen, “Always busy? 8 ways to stay fit”, in CNN:
glosses: Having much work to do; having much to get done.
examples: text: Flowers, stripes, and checks in the same fabric make for a busy pattern.
glosses: Having a lot going on; complicated or intricate.
examples: text: I will be hanged if some eternal villain,
 Some busy and insinuating rogue,
 Some cogging, cozening slave, to get some office,
 Have not devised this slander; I'll be hanged else.
ref: c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene ii], line 130:
glosses: Officious; meddling.
Synonyms: swamped
Derived terms: busihead
busily
business
busy as a beaver
busy as a bee
busy as a dyke in a hardware store
busy as a nailer
busy as a one-armed paper hanger
busy beaver
busy beaver function
busy bee
busy board
busybody
busy body
busy book
busy box
busyish
busy little beaver
busy loop
busyness
busy-ness
busy signal
busy work
busy-work
embusy
ever-busy
fast busy signal
get busy
I'm busy
nonbusy
semibusy
superbusy
the line is busy
underbusy
Wheal Busy