cloy
pronunciation
How to pronounce cloy in British English:
UK [klɔɪ]
How to pronounce cloy in American English:
US [klɔɪ]
-
- Verb:
- supply or feed to surfeit
- cause surfeit through excess though initially pleasing
Word Origin
- cloy
- cloy: [14] Cloy originally meant ‘fasten with a nail’. It is a reduced form of the long obsolete acloy, which came from Anglo-Norman acloyer. This was a variant of Old French encloyer, a descendant of the Vulgar Latin compound verb inclāvāre, based on Latin clāvus ‘nail’ (source of Latin claudere ‘shut’, from which English gets close).=> close
- cloy (v.)
- "weary by too much, fill to loathing, surfeit," 1520s, from Middle English cloyen "hinder movement, encumber" (late 14c.), a shortening of accloyen (early 14c.), from Old French encloer "to fasten with a nail, grip, grasp," figuratively "to hinder, check, stop, curb," from Late Latin inclavare "drive a nail into a horse's foot when shoeing," from Latin clavus "a nail" (see slot (n.2)). Accloye is a hurt that cometh of shooing, when a Smith driveth a nail in the quick, which make him to halt. [Edward Topsell, "The History of Four-footed Beasts," 1607] The figurative meaning "fill to a satiety, overfill" is attested for accloy from late 14c. Related: Cloyed; cloying.
Example
- 1. The pleasures of idleness soon cloy .
- 2. Will it ever cloy , this odd diversity of misery and joy
- 3. The smell of her cheap perfume soon began to cloy .
- 4. Will it ever cloy , this odd diversity of misery and joy ?
- 5. Chocolates start to cloy if you eat too many .