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Sunday May 7, 2000

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facetious \fuh-SEE-shuhs\ , adjective:
1. Given to jesting; playfully jocular.
2. Amusing; intended to be humorous; not serious.

J. K. Morley was being both serious and facetious when he claimed that "the world's greatest water power is woman's tears."
-- Tom Lutz, Crying: The Natural and Cultural History of Tears

He was by all odds the liveliest, most genial man in the group--"a most engaging and entertaining companion of a sweet, even and lively temper, full of facetious stories always applied with judgment and introduced apropos."
-- Richard M. Ketchum, Saratoga: Turning Point of America's Revolutionary War

Facetious comes from French facetieux, from Latin facetia, "wit," from facetus, "witty."

Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for facetious

 

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