sophy

name

1. A diminutive of the female given name Sophia.

   “I knew Sophy was a good girl, and would not fall in love to make me angry.”

noun

1. (alt-of, archaic)Archaic form of Safawi (“a member of the Safavid dynasty”).

   “The great tent on the lawn, wherein presently we are to sup,—blue and yellow without, and within all braveries of tapestry and of table service,—suggests a state pavilion of the Sophy camped for glittering war.”

2. (obsolete, uncountable)wisdom, knowledge, learning

   “It had ben) beter to haue kepte the same sophie”

   “Turn thee to mee, in caſe Manhod ther bee ſo much left in thy hert: Coom fight with mee: that on my helmet wear Apolloes laurel, both for learnings laude, And eke for Martiall prayſe: that, in my ſhield, The ſeuenfold ſophie of Minerue contein: A match, more meet, ſir king, than any here.”

   “Who knoweth not the difference betweene…semblance, and assurance; docosophy, and sophy?”

3. (alt-of)Alternative letter-case form of Sophy (“archaic form of Safawi”).
4. (obsolete)A wise man; a sage.

   “Yet notwithstanding some men in sundrie nations have mounted above the common rate, and indevored to cherish and advaunce the said Insights, and drawen some small sparkes of truth and wisedome out of them, as out of some little fire raked up under a great heape of ashes; the which they have afterward taught unto others, and for so doing have bene called Sophies and Philosophers, that is to say, Wise men and lovers of wisedome.”

   “These Sophies finde with the Babe Iesus, onely Marie.”

   “The Angels caroll’d loud their song of peace, The cursed oracles were strucken dumb, To see their Shepherd, the poor shepherds press, To see their King, the kingly sophies come, And them to guide unto his Master’s home, A star comes dancing up the orient, That springs for joy over the starry tent. Where gold to make their prince a crown they all present.”

   “You that nothing have Like Schollars but a Beard and Gowne, for me May pass for good grand Sophies […]”

   “It is no thanks then to us, that very children among us do believe and confess these high mysterious points, whereof Plato, and Aristotle, and all the other grand sophies among them were ignorant; since we owe our whole knowledge herein, not to our own natural sagacity or industry, wherein they were beyond most of us, but to divine and supernatural revelation.”

5. (alt-of, obsolete)Obsolete spelling of sophi.

   “Hange thy selfe Drusus, hast nor arms nor brain? Some Sophy say, The Gods sell all for paine.”

6. Any one of the various fields of study whose names end in -sophy.

   “The various sophy’s — cosmosophy, kerdosophy.”