Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • interjection Used to express regret or disapproval.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An exclamation of sorrow or regret; alas! alas the day! Also lawka-day.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • interjection Alack the day; alas; -- an expression of sorrow, regret, dissatisfaction, or surprise.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • interjection dated An expression of regret or grief.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Alteration of alack the day.]

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Examples

  • We missed the Willems portion lackaday but caught Yee and Lubar.

    Archive 2006-06-01 fusenumber8 2006

  • But, as she once sang in a flop by Walter and Jean Kerr called Goldilocks (she blames them, too), "Heigh-ho, a-lackaday."

    Broadway's Golden Girls 2002

  • But, as she once sang in a flop by Walter and Jean Kerr called Goldilocks (she blames them, too), "Heigh-ho, a-lackaday."

    Broadway's Golden Girls 2002

  • My father, however, is a proud man, a gallant knight and tried soldier of the oldest blood, to whom this man's churlish birth and low descent ---- Oh, lackaday!

    The White Company Doyle, Arthur Conan, Sir, 1859-1930 1902

  • My father, however, is a proud man, a gallant knight and tried soldier of the oldest blood, to whom this man's churlish birth and low descent ---- Oh, lackaday!

    The White Company Doyle, Arthur Conan, Sir, 1859-1930 1902

  • My father, however, is a proud man, a gallant knight and tried soldier of the oldest blood, to whom this man's churlish birth and low descent ---- Oh, lackaday!

    The White Company Arthur Conan Doyle 1894

  • I have been living on in a thirtover, lackaday way, and have not seen what it may lead to!

    Tess of the d'Urbervilles 1891

  • My father, however, is a proud man, a gallant knight and tried soldier of the oldest blood, to whom this man's churlish birth and low descent -- -- Oh, lackaday!

    The White Company 1890

  • I have been living on in a thirtover, lackaday way, and have not seen what it may lead to!

    Tess of the d'Urbervilles Thomas Hardy 1884

  • See, lackaday! the lady of Dolberg's beautiful chamois skin that was to be dyed of a delicate green for her ladyship's slippers.

    The Young Emigrants; Madelaine Tube; the Boy and the Book; and Crystal Palace Susan Anne Livingston Ridley Sedgwick 1827

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