Dictionaries › English

canny

Pronunciation: /ˈkæni/

The English word “canny” has 9 meanings listed here.

adjective

  1. Careful, prudent, cautious.
  2. Knowing, shrewd, astute.
  3. Frugal, thrifty.
  4. Friendly, pleasant, fair, agreeable; (sometimes) funny.
  5. Gentle, quiet, steady.
  6. Natural, normal.
  7. Sounding as if it is coming through a tin can.

adverb

  1. Very, considerably; quite, rather.
  2. Gently, quietly; carefully, skilfully.

Etymology

Northern English dialect, from can (“to know”) ( + -y), from Middle English can, first and third person singular of cunnen, connen (“to be able, know how to”), from Old English cunnan (“to know how to, be able to”). Compare Scots canny, English cunny, Old English cann (“knowledge, assertion”). More at can, cunning.

Keep exploring: in the interactive dictionary every word of a definition is a link. Open “canny” there

More English words

About this dictionary

The English dictionary on Glottosphere has 650,529 entries with a page. Browse the English dictionary.

Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.