subs. (popular).—1. A matron: the correlative of GOOD-MAN = husband. (Used like AUNTIE, and MOTHER, and GAMMER, in addressing or describing an inferior.) (A corruption of GOOD-WIFE).
1598. FLORIO, A Worlde of Wordes, s.v. Mona, … Also a nickname for women as we say gammer, GOODIE, goodwife, such a one.
1689. Accounts of the Churchwardens of Sprowston. Paid GOODY Crabbin for washing the surplis and church powrch, 1s. 3d.
1707. SWIFT, Baucis and Philemon.
| Plain GOODY would no longer down, | |
| ’Twas Madam, in her grogram gown. |
1714. GAY, The Shepherd’s Week, Fri., l. 107.
| Swarm’d on a rotten stick the bees I spy’d | |
| Which erst I saw when GOODY Dopson dy’d. |
1802. BLOOMFIELD, Rural Tales, ‘Richard and Kate.’ Come, GOODY, stop your humdrum wheel.
1816. JOHNSON, A Dictionary of the English Language, s.v. A low term of civility used to mean persons.
1837. R. H. BARHAM, The Ingoldsby Legends, ‘The Witches’ Frolic.’
| Old GOODY Price | |
| Had got something nice. |
Hence GOODYSHIP = ‘ladyship.’
1663. BUTLER, Hudibras, pt. I., c. 3. 517.
| The more shame for her GOODYSHIP | |
| To give so near a friend the slip. |
2. (colloquial).—A religious hypocrite, male or female; the ‘unco guid’ of Burns.
1836. KIDD, London Ambulator, p. 14. Clapham is celebrated for GOODIES—ladies of a certain age, who not having succeeded in finessing for husbands, betake themselves to a religious life as a dernier resort.
Hence GOODY-GOODYISM = sentimental piety.
1892. Pall Mall Gazette, 23 Nov., p. 3, c. 1. The Christmas tale of adventure … has perhaps cast off its element of GOODY-GOODYISM, but the general features and cast are as of old.
3. generally in pl. (colloquial).—Sweetmeats; bon-bons; cakes and buns.
1853. H. MAYHEW, Letters Left at a Pastrycook’s. Propped up on each side with bags of oranges, cakes, and GOODIES.
1855. H. A. MURRAY, Lands of the Slave and the Free, ch. xii. Adjourning from time to time to some café for the purpose of eating ices or sucking GOODIES.
4. (American).—The kernel of a nut.
Adj. (colloquial).—Well-meaning but petty; officiously pious. Also GOODY-GOODY.
1864. D. W. THOMPSON, Daydreams of a Schoolmaster, p. 230. I would rather they were not too good; or GOODY. Let us have a little naughtiness, sprinkled in at intervals.
1892. SYDNEY WATSON, Wops the Waif, p. 7. He knew well enough the whole of this enterprise had sprung from a GOODY-GOODY idea of ‘doing something,’ born of impulse and whim.
