dote

verb
/dəʊt/UK/doʊt/US

Etymology

The verb is derived from Middle English doten, from Middle Low German doten (“to be foolish”) or Middle Dutch doten (“to be silly”). Doublet of doit (Scottish English). The noun in the sense of "imbecile" is derived from Middle English dote (“simpleton”), itself from doten (see above). The noun in the sense of "darling" and "decay" is derived from the modern verb.

  1. inherited from dote
  2. derived from doten — “to be silly
  3. derived from doten — “to be foolish
  4. inherited from doten

Definitions

  1. To be weakly or foolishly fond of somebody.

    • Little Bill's parents just keep doting on him.
    • Jules doted on Chris, spending hours while Chris was at school assembling vast cities out of microscopic Lego pieces to surprise him when he returned.
  2. To act in a foolish manner

    To act in a foolish manner; to be senile.

    • He survived the use of his reason, grew infatuated, and doted long before he died.
    • Time has made you dote, and vainly tell / Of arms imagined in your lonely cell.
  3. To rot, decay.

  4. + 5 more definitions
    1. A darling, a cutie.

      • But to be sure baby Boardman was as good as gold, a perfect little dote in his new fancy bib.
    2. An imbecile

      An imbecile; a dotard.

      • How did his death-bed make him a doate!
    3. Decay in a tree.

    4. Dowry.

    5. To endow, donate.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at dote. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01dote02foolish03conclude04close05passage06path07taken08fond09doting

A definitional loop anchored at dote. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

9 hops · closes at dote

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA