See also: Zot, and zòt

English

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Etymology 1

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A sound effect. Popularized by the Usenet Oracle, a humorous Internet advice service, where the word was used as an irritated dismissal of a question.

Pronunciation

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Verb

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zot (third-person singular simple present zots, present participle zotting, simple past and past participle zotted)

  1. (slang, transitive) To zap, kill, or destroy.
    • 1980, Kit Reed, Magic time:
      I reached for the handle and it zotted me — an electric shock to the elbow.
    • 1997, Matt Lepinski, “Zotting”, in rec.humor.oracle.d (Usenet):
      I've heard rumors about the oracle zotting people and I have these questions about zot?
    • 1997, Terry Moore, “COPS PUT LIVES ON LINE?”, in austin.general (Usenet):
      When a taxi driver, convenience store clerk, pizza deliverer, etc., gets zotted, it is on the back page of the local newspaper and not in out of town newspapers at all.
    • 1998, RosieDawg, “watergardening and dogs and Rosie's new toy, OT-ish”, in rec.ponds (Usenet):
      electric fence - zotting me was fine (well really!) but they were worried about zotting the several dozen human puppies that hang around at our house.

Etymology 2

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Sound effect in the comic strip B.C., first published in 1958, associated with both (1) the rapid tongue of an anteater character and (2) lightning bolts.

Noun

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zot (plural zots)

  1. (US, slang) An anteater.

Interjection

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zot

  1. (US) The characteristic sound made by an anteater's tongue or by lightning.

Usage notes

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Etymology 3

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This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.
Particularly: “From Dutch zot or Afrikaans sot?”

Noun

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zot (plural zots)

  1. (South Africa, Zimbabwe, ethnic slur, offensive, derogatory) A black person.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:person of color
    • 2000 April 9, Squirrel, “SA Silence on Mugabe's actions”, in soc.culture.south-africa[3] (Usenet):
      Regretfully there is nothing that can be done about things .. just a time bomb ticking, ticking, ticking .. until one day soon, the zots will decide to take a property here, and a property there (they have after all started with vacant land and been successful), so why not progress to property?
    • 2000 October 29, Nude Raider, “Here are the facts...”, in soc.culture.south-africa[4] (Usenet):
      (SA) ¶ The government has TACITLY condoned the actions of the zots by allowing them to continue their illegal occupation.
      (Zimbabwe) ¶ The government condoned the illegal activities and progressed to the point where they were actively supporting it.
    • 2002 July 5, Alistair, “Re: Tobacco barn and other assets- disassembly instructions”, in soc.culture.zimbabwe[5] (Usenet):
      The zots will destroy the barns, the homesteads, the tractors, everything - reducing them to their component parts without the aid of explosives.

Anagrams

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Albanian

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Pronunciation

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Noun

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zot m (plural zotër, definite zoti, definite plural zotërinj)

  1. master, headman
  2. boss, head
  3. (religion) Lord, God
  4. sir, mister

Derived terms

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Noun

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zot m (plural zotër, definite zoti, definite plural zotërinj)

  1. landowner, owner of a wealthy estate
  2. lord, head of a wealthy family with servants

Declension

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Demiraj, B. (1997) Albanische Etymologien: Untersuchungen zum albanischen Erbwortschatz (Leiden Studies in Indo-European; 7)‎[1] (in German), Amsterdam, Atlanta: Rodopi, pages 431-2
  2. ^ Mann, Stuart E. (1977) An Albanian Historical Grammar[2], Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag, →ISBN, page 72

Further reading

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Dutch

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Etymology

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From Middle Dutch sot, a borrowing from Old French sot, from Medieval Latin sottus, of unknown origin. Possibly an expressive interjection, similar to modern French zut! (damn it!).[1][2]

Compare Old English sott (foolish, stupid), English sot, modern French sot.

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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zot (comparative zotter, superlative zotst) (today mostly restricted to Belgium and colloquial Southern Netherlands)

  1. crazy
  2. mad

Usage notes

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Declension

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Declension of zot
uninflected zot
inflected zotte
comparative zotter
positive comparative superlative
predicative/adverbial zot zotter het zotst
het zotste
indefinite m./f. sing. zotte zottere zotste
n. sing. zot zotter zotste
plural zotte zottere zotste
definite zotte zottere zotste
partitive zots zotters

Synonyms

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Derived terms

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Descendants

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  • Afrikaans: sot
  • Berbice Creole Dutch: soto
  • Negerhollands: sot

Noun

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zot m (plural zotten, diminutive zotje n) (today mostly restricted to Belgium and colloquial Southern Netherlands)

  1. a fool

Usage notes

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  • Same as above.

Descendants

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References

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  1. ^ Metzler, I. (2015). Fools and Idiots? Intellectual Disability in the Middle Ages. United States: Manchester University Press.
  2. ^ van der Sijs, Nicoline, editor (2010), “zot”, in Etymologiebank, Meertens Institute

Mauritian Creole

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Etymology

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From French les autres (the other guys).

In French, the plural word autres is commonly preceded by a word, such as aux, les or mes, whose final s or x is not pronounced except in front of vowels, where it is pronounced /z/. As a result, autres was reanalyzed as having /z/ at the beginning.

Pronoun

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zot

  1. you, y'all (second-person plural personal pronoun)
  2. they, them (third-person plural personal pronoun)

Usage notes

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When usage might be ambiguous, zot is reserved for second-person plural and bann-la is used instead for third-person plural.

See also

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