Easy
Pronunciation
- IPA: /ˈiËzi/
- Rhymes: -iËzi
Origin
From Middle English eesy, esy, partly from Middle English ese ("ease") + -y, equivalent to ease + -y, and partly from Old French aisié ("eased, at ease, at leisure"), past participle of aisier ("to put at ease"), from aise ("empty space, elbow room, opportunity"), of uncertain origin. See ease. Merged with Middle English ethe, eathe ("not difficult, easy"), from Old English Ä“aþe, Ä«eþe ("easy, smooth, not difficult"), from Proto-Germanic *auþaz, *auþijaz ("easy, pleasing"), from *auþiz ("vacant, empty"), from Proto-Indo-European *aut- ("empty, lonely"). Compare also Old Saxon Åþi ("easy, vacant, empty"), Old High German Ådi ("easy, effortless, vacant, empty"), Old Norse auðr ("easy, vacant, empty"). More at ease, eath.
Full definition of easy
Adjective
easy
- (now rare except in certain expressions) Comfortable; at ease.
- 1918, W. B. Maxwell, The Mirror and the Lamp Chapter 16, “… She takes the whole thing with desperate seriousness. But the others are all easy and jovial—thinking about the good fare that is soon to be eaten, about the hired fly, about anything.â€
- In the middle of the room was a fluffy easy chair. Now that I know it's taken care of, I can rest easy at night.
- Requiring little skill or effort.It's often easy to wake up but hard to get up.
- 2013-08-10, A new prescription, As the world's drug habit shows, governments are failing in their quest to monitor every London window-box and Andean hillside for banned plants. But even that Sisyphean task looks easy next to the fight against synthetic drugs. No sooner has a drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one.
- The teacher gave an easy test to her students.
- (informal, pejorative, of a person) Consenting readily to sex.He has a reputation for being easy; they say he slept with half the senior class.