Some 16th-century Italian clergymen tried to ban coffee because they believed it to be “satanic.” However, Pope Clement VII loved coffee so much that he lifted the ban and had coffee baptized in 1600.
DUFF
duff, plum duff
(noun) a stiff flour pudding steamed or boiled usually and containing e.g. currants and raisins and citron
Source: WordNet® 3.1
Etymology 1
Noun
duff (countable and uncountable, plural duffs)
(dialectal) Dough.
A stiff flour pudding, often with dried fruit, boiled in a cloth bag, or steamed.
Etymology 2
Noun
duff (countable and uncountable, plural duffs)
(Scotland, US) Decaying vegetable matter on the forest floor.
A pudding-style dessert, especially one made with plums.
Coal dust, especially that left after screening or combined with other small, unsaleable bits of coal.
Fine and dry coal in small pieces, usually anthracite.
(British) A mixture of coal and rock.
(slang) The bits left in the bottom of the bag after the booty has been consumed, like crumbs.
Something spurious or fake; a counterfeit, a worthless thing.
(baseball, slang, 1800s) An error.
Adjective
duff (comparative duffer, superlative duffest)
(UK) Worthless; not working properly, defective.
Synonyms
• (defective): bum (US)
Etymology 3
Origin uncertain; perhaps the same as Etymology 1, above.
Noun
duff (plural duffs)
(US, slang) The buttocks.
Etymology 4
Verb
duff (third-person singular simple present duffs, present participle duffing, simple past and past participle duffed)
(slang, obsolete) To disguise something to make it look new.
(Australia) To alter the branding of stolen cattle; to steal cattle.
(British, slang, with "up") To beat up.
(US, golf) To hit the ground behind the ball.
Etymology 5
Noun
duff (plural duffs)
Alternative form of daf (type of drum)
Noun
DUFF (plural DUFFs)
(slang, derogatory) Acronym of dumb/designated ugly fat friend, an attractive woman's less attractive friend
Etymology
Proper noun
Duff
A surname.
An unincorporated community in Indiana
A village in Saskatchewan, Canada
An unincorporated community in Tennessee
A male given name
Source: Wiktionary
Duff, n. Etym: [From OE. dagh. . See Dough.]
1. Dough or paste. [Prov. Eng.] Halliwell.
2. A stiff flour pudding, boiled in a bag; -- a term used especially by seamen; as, plum duff.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
Recent Word Finds
Word of the Day
25 March 2025
IMMOBILIZATION
(noun) fixation (as by a plaster cast) of a body part in order to promote proper healing; “immobilization of the injured knee was necessary”
Coffee Trivia
