DILLY-DAW NOUN one who is both slovenly and slow ...1814 Sc. obs. ETYMOLOGY from dilly as in dilly-dally + daw (a slattern, a drab, an untidy woman) FIRST DOCUMENTED USE 1814 - see EXAMPLE below EXAMPLE "...But say't yoursels leddies; I'm no a man that's near mysel'; the walth he has seen it meet in his providence to bestow on me, I wad like to use in moderation; an' is it no angersom to see her like a dilly daw, an' bits o' creatures that she could keep at her fire-side, buskit up like Flanders-babies..." From: The Saxon and the Gael; or, The Northern Metropolis: including A View of the Lowland and Highland Character - Christian Isobel Johnstone
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