# busy

Pronunciation: say "BI-zee" /ˈbɪzi/

## Adjective

1. Having a great deal of work to do or many tasks that need getting done.
   - Simple: Having a lot of work or tasks to do.
   - _The manager stayed busy throughout the holiday rush._
   - _Doctors are especially busy during flu season._
2. Crowded with activity or commerce, with a great deal going on at once.
   - Simple: Full of people, traffic, or activity.
   - _The harbor was busy with ships loading cargo._
   - _Holiday weekends make the airport especially busy._
3. Currently occupied or in use, and so unavailable to others.
   - Simple: Being used by someone, so not free at the moment.
   - _I kept getting a busy signal all afternoon._
   - _Both meeting rooms were busy, so we waited outside._
5. Full of detail or activity to the point of seeming cluttered or intricate.
   - Simple: Having so many details or parts that it looks messy or hard to follow.
   - _The dashboard design is busy, crowding too many gauges together._
   - _Critics called the film's visuals busy and overwhelming._

## Verb

4. To make someone active or occupied, giving them a task to fill their time.
   - Simple: To give someone something to do so they stay active.
   - _He busied his hands with knitting while waiting._
   - _To keep her mind off the test results, she tried to busy herself cleaning out every closet in the house._

## Other meanings

- (adjective) Officious and meddling; inclined to interfere in matters that are not one's own.
- (noun) A police officer: a derogatory slang term used in and around Liverpool.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–3, 5** — Old English bisiġ ("busy, occupied, diligent") came from Proto-West Germanic *bisīg and became Middle English bisy. Dutch bezig and Low German besig, both meaning "busy," are related. The u in the spelling shows how West Midland and Southern dialects said the word, while today's pronunciation with /ɪ/ comes from East Midlands dialects.
**Meaning 4** — This verb continues Middle English bisien. Its Old English ancestor, bisgian, could mean to occupy, employ, trouble or afflict, and it goes back to *bisīgōn in Proto-West Germanic. A related word is bisgia ("to use") in Old Frisian.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/busy (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).