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A woman seems lost in thoughts and moving back and forth in the room, and her mother feels sad about her situation and says to her:

I never knew you to be so fuzzy-headed, Janet. Angela Lansburry (see:52:38-52:48)

By "know", does the mother mean "I have never seen you so fuzzy-headed"?

or

does she mean "I didn't know that you have personality that can easily turn into being fuzzy-headed?

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  • Your cited utterance is very unlikely from a native speaker. It would normally be expressed as I never knew you to be so [whatever], or more likely I have never known you to be so [whatever], but 1) the construction is "formal", and doesn't sit well with fuzzy-headed, and 2) it's dated, reminiscent of Victorian English.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 20 at 15:16
  • @FumbleFingers, It is actually said by an old lady in a movie. I updated the source.
    – Yunus
    Commented Oct 20 at 16:33
  • It's effectively an outdated / never particularly common usage. Don't copy it, for the reasons I gave above. Scriptwriters sometimes include unusual turns of phrase because of the impression they give, without necessarily knowing or caring whether real people actually do (or indeed ever did) speak like that. But they probably wouldn't put that one in the mouth of a younger or more "modern-sounding" character.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 20 at 16:52
  • @FumbleFingers, By the way yes, you are right. She says "I never knew you TO BE....", which I missed in my question text. I will update it now. Also I appreciate your explanations about it being outdated.
    – Yunus
    Commented Oct 20 at 17:06
  • Well, all this doesn't directly relate to your question (what does to know mean here?). But your question text is right on the money with I have never seen you so fuzzy-headed - which corrects both "less-than-idiomatic" issues (the choice of verb and the verb tense). Note that we wouldn't normally include to be after seen, only after known.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 20 at 17:12

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It's know in the sense;

have personal experience of (an emotion or situation).

"a man who had known better times"

So, yes, it's your first option. She has never before witnessed Janet behaving like that.

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