Other forms: oldies
An oldie is a song that was popular long ago. A golden oldie, play the oldies, an oldies station.
Golden oldie is the fixed phrase and is affectionate rather than dismissive. The word is also used of people, where it is informal and best kept to somebody who will laugh at it.
1nounoldieA song that was popular long ago.
“The radio station plays oldies from the sixties and seventies all night.”
oldie is a song.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₂el- (grow)
Proto-Indo-European
*h₂el- — grown, tall, big
Proto-Germanic
*aldaz — grown-up
Proto-West Germanic
*ald
Old English
ald
Middle English
old
English
old
English, today
oldie
Built from
From old + -ie. old Middle English old, oold, from Old English ald, eald (“old, aged, ancient, antique, primeval”), from Proto-West Germanic ald, from Proto-Germanic aldaz (“grown-up”), originally a participle form, from Proto-Indo-European h₂el- (“grown, tall, big”). 2 Cognate with Scots aald, auld (“old”), yol yola, yolaw, yold, yole (“old”), frr ool, ual, uuil, uul, üülj (“old”), stq oold (“old”), West Frisian âld (“old”), gsw altu, oalt, oalts, olt, àltà (“old”), bar oid (“old”), gmw-cfr alt, aod, auw, oot (“old”), cim and German alt (“old”), Dutch oud (“old”), German Low German old, oolt (“old”), lb al (“old”), mhn òlt (“old”), wym aołd (“old”), Yiddish אַלט (“old”), Danish ældre (“elderly”), Faroese eldri (“elder, older”), Icelandic aldinn (“old”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk eldre (“elderly”), Swedish äldre (“elderly”), gme-cgo alt (“old”), Gothic 𐌰𐌻𐌸𐌴𐌹𐍃 (“old”), Latin altus (“high, tall, grown big, lofty”). Related to eld.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA