Holmesy

English

Etymology

From Holmes +‎ -y.

Proper noun

Holmesy

diminutive of Holmes.
- 1910, H[arrie] Irving Hancock, “Greg Overhears a Pretty Girl’s Tribute”, in Dick Prescott’s First Year at West Point or Two Chums in the Cadet Gray, Akron, Ohio: The Saalfield Publishing Company:
  Then, just before time was called, Greg got his left eye too much in line with the yearling’s right fist. Dazed, Cadet Holmes was saved only by the word from the time-keeper. […] “Make it short, Holmesy, or you’re going to meet with more damage, I reckon.”
- 1918, James Francis Thierry, chapter VII, in The Adventure of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons: […], New York, N.Y.: The Neale Publishing Company, […], page 71:
  “Time for luncheon, ain’t it, Holmesy, old boy?” I questioned. “Yes. Sure, Watson. I’m hungry, too, after all that heavy thought. We’ll go in and have luncheon now, and then we’ll get some swift action.” Thereupon Holmes led the way to the dining-room, where the others awaited us.
- 1995, The Baker Street Journal, page 191:
  Conan Doyle reveals in the opening chapter that he is upset that the occurrence at the Reichenbach falls did not rid him of an obligation to publish more tales about “Holmesy.”
- 2003, David Corbett, Done for a Dime, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 105:
  “Holmesy.” Murchison pulled up and rested against the next desk over. “Mr. Marchand. Anything to tell?” Holmes looked up at last.
- 2017, John Green, Turtles All the Way Down, Dutton Books, →ISBN, page 31:
  “Aza Holmes?” he asked. […] “Hi,” I said. […] “To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, his voice flat, neutral, unreadable. Daisy walked up behind me and held out her hand, then shook Davis’s forcefully. “Daisy Ramirez, Holmesy’s best friend. We had a canoe puncture.”
- 2021, Kenneth Johnson, Holmes Coming, Blackstone Publishing, published 2022, →ISBN:
  Zapper leaned around and held up his hand to Holmes for a high-five, saying. “Holmesy, that was totally cold!”

Adjective

Holmesy (comparative more Holmesy, superlative most Holmesy)

Resembling or characteristic of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes.
- 1931, Vincent Starrett, Dead Man Inside, The Crime Club, Inc., page 57:
  There were detectives enough to populate a village. […] “Nothing Holmesy about those dicks,” he observed, sotto voce, to Rainfall. “They wouldn’t know a steamfitter from a country parson by his coat lapel; […]”
- 1971, Adrian Mitchell, The Bodyguard, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., →LCCN, page 53:
  ‘Look, it was the first holiday I’d ever had in my life and I wanted it to be a real holiday, a real rest. I didn’t want to spend it interrogating a girl just on the basis of a Holmesy hunch, did I? I was tired.’
- 2014, Kathrin Glüer-Pagin, Peter Pagin, “Vulcan Might Have Existed, and Neptune Not: On the Semantics of Empty Names”, in Manuel García-Carpintero, Genoveva Martí, editors, Empty Representations: Reference and Non-Existence, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, part II (Accounts of Empty Representations), page 127:
  According to him, believing that Sherlock Holmes is a detective and believing that Dr Watson is a detective amount to a certain three-place relation obtaining between the subject, the gappy detective proposition, and different ways of believing (cf. Braun 2002, 2005). Whatever it precisely means to believe a proposition in a Holmesy way (as opposed to a Watsony way), this proposal obviously will result in an unexpectedly large number of different ways of believing.

Synonyms