Mousy

Definition: Mousy

Mousy

Adjective

1. Timid and ineffectual.

2. Having a drab pale brown color resembling a mouse; "a mousy grownish-gray color"; "mouse-colored hair"; "a mouselike rodent".

Date "mousy" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1913. (references)

Synonyms: Mousy

Synonyms: mouse-colored (adj), mouselike (adj), mousey (adj). (additional references)

Crosswords: Mousy

English words defined with "mousy": lank ♦ mouse-colored, mouselike. (references)

"Mousy" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 94.12% of the time. "Mousy" is used about 17 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted)

Parts of Speech	Percent	Usage per 100 Million Words	Rank in English
Adjective (general or positive)	94.12%	16	87,710
Noun (proper)	5.88%	1	339,140
Total	100.00%	17	N/A

Hyphenated Usage
	Beginning with "mousy": mousy-brown, mousy-grey, mousy-haired, mousy-looking.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com.

Language		Translations for "mousy"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses.
Albanian		miu (mousey, ratty), timid (mousey), i strukur (mousey, poor spirited, shy), i druajtur (backward, bashful, chary, coy, diffluent, faint-hearted, mousey, self-effacing, shy, timid). (various references)

Chinese		老� 似. (various references)

Czech		hnìdý (Brown, nut-brown). (various references)

German		mausgrau (mouse-coloured, mousey). (various references)

Greek		ποντικοειδήσ (mousey, ratty). (various references)

Hungarian		egérszürke, tele egerekkel, nagyon csendes, egérszerű. (various references)

Italian		da topo (mousey). (various references)

Korean		쥐 같은. (various references)

Pig Latin		ousymay

Portuguese		tímido (afraid, apprehensive, backward, bashful, blushing, diffident, eery, faint-hearted, fearful, fearsome, gawk, mousey, poor-spirited, pusillanimous, rabbity, shamefaced, sheep-faced, sheepish, shy, timid, timorous, tremulant, tremulous, unassertive), pardacento (mousey). (various references)

Romanian		timid (bashful, coy, diffident, hesitating, maiden, maidenly, milky, pigeon-hearted, retiring, self conscious, sheepish, shy, sissy, timid, timorous), tãcut (close-lipped, discreet, dumb, mum, quiet, reserved, silent, silently, still, sullen, tacit, voiceless), sfios (backward, bashful, coy, demure, faint-hearted, maiden, maidenlike, maidenly, meek, milky, retiring, self conscious, sheepish, shy, timid, timorous), plin de şoareci, gri închis, de şoarece. (various references)

Russian		мышиный. (various references)

Serbo-Croatian		mišji (mousey), plašljiv (afraid, craven, fearful, fearsome, henhearted, hen-hearted, lily livered, mousey, scary, shy, timid, tremulous). (various references)

Spanish		tímido (afraid, bashful, blushing, capon, coy, diffident, faint-hearted, fearful, mousey, nervous, shamefaced, sheepish, shy, timid, timorous, tongue tied), ratoncito (mousekin), pardusco (brownish, drab, mousey). (various references)

Swedish		musgrå (mouse-colored, mouse-coloured, mousey), blyg (abashed, bashful, coy, demure, diffident, mousey, self-conscious, shamefaced, shy, timid). (various references)

Turkish		mahçup (ashamed, confused, embarrassed, maidenly, pudent, retiring, shame-faced, timid), fare gibi (murine, ratty), ürkek (faint, fainthearted, fearful, gun-shy, jumpy, nervous, nervy, scary, shrinking, shy, skittish, timid, timorous, tremulous), çekingen (backward, bashful, coy, demure, diffident, distrustful of oneself, eunuch, faint, fainthearted, farouche, reserved, retiring, shrinking, shy, standoffish, timid, timorous, uncommunicative, unsociable, unsocial, withdrawn). (various references)

Ukrainian		мишка (mousey), мишачий (mousey). (various references)

Vietnamese		xám xịt (drab, livid, subfusc), lắm chuột như chuột, hôi mùi chuột nhút nhát. (various references)
Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references.

Misspellings
	"Mousy" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: meusien, mobus, mokus, Momus, moosie, moosy, Mopsy, Moruzzi, Mosby, mosy, Mouayad, moues, mougy, Moulsey, Mouly, mous, mousie, mousr, Moussy, moust, mouzy, mpus, Muluzi, mursy, musie, Nouby, Nouy, omsy, wousy. (additional references)
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references).

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams
	Words within the letters "m-o-s-u-y"
	-1 letter: sumo.
	-2 letters: mos, mus, oms, som, sou, soy, sum, yom, you, yum.
	-3 letters: mo, mu, my, om, os, oy, so, um, us, yo.
	Words containing the letters "m-o-s-u-y"
	+1 letter: cymous, koumys, mousey.
	+2 letters: chymous, koumyss, mousily.
	+3 letters: costumey, didymous, euonymus, evonymus, famously, koumyses, mucosity, syconium.
	+4 letters: amorously, anonymous, costumery, customary, emulously, eponymous, fulsomely, impiously, koumysses, museology, myoclonus, myomatous, myxovirus, ominously, pompously, pseudonym, puppydoms, sympodium, symposium, tautonyms, timeously, voyeurism.
	+5 letters: antonymous, bigamously, collyriums, compulsory, consumedly, cumbrously, currycombs, dysprosium, enormously, euonymuses, evonymuses, gruesomely, hemizygous, homonymous, homozygous, humorously, hydroniums, infamously, luminosity, luminously, monogynous, mosquitoey, multistory, musicology, mutinously, mystagogue, mysterious, myxomatous, neodymiums, numerously, paronymous, polygamous, polygonums, polysemous, pseudonyms, puromycins, subeconomy, symposiums, synonymous, timorously, uropygiums, venomously, voyeurisms.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.