tattle
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈtæt(ə)l/
ipa: /ˈtætl̩/
ipa: [-æɾl̩]
rhymes: -ætəl
Forms: form: tattles
Etymology: From Middle Dutch tatelen, tateren (“to babble, chatter”) (modern Dutch tatelen, tateren (“to talk, chatter”)), originally imitative. The word is cognate with Saterland Frisian tätelje (“to talk nonsense, babble”), Middle Low German tāteren, tadderen (“to babble, chatter”) (whence modern German Low German tatern (“to chatter”)), Low German tateln, täteln (“to cackle, gabble”). Compare also Middle English dadel, dadull (“tattling, gossip”), and its alteration twaddle.
Senses: examples: text: We agree on almost nothing, everything is a battle / Every secret from him is kept, his rep is being a tattle
ref: 2015, K. L. Philpotts, “Little Bro”, in The Chocolate Chip Cookie Tree: A Collection of Poems and Illustrations, Denver, Colo.: Outskirts Press, →ISBN, page 23:
glosses: A tattletale.
examples: text: Have a special small bucket called the tattle bucket. Make name cards for each child. […] When children have a tattle, instead of disrupting the class, they get their name card and put it in the tattle bucket. Look in the bucket at varying times during the day. If you see a name card, go to the child and say, "I see you have your name card in the tattle bucket. What would you like to tell me?" Many times, children will have forgotten all about the tattle.
ref: 2009, Maryln Appelbaum, “How to Handle Children Who are Disruptive”, in How to Handle Hard-to-handle Preschoolers: A Guide for Early Childhood Educators, Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin Press, SAGE Publishing; Appelbaum Training Institute, →ISBN, page 4:
glosses: Often said of children: a piece of incriminating information or an account of wrongdoing that is said about another person.
examples: text: Prattles and Tattles, / O'er Bottles, / Shall ſtill cheriſh my Fancy, / Better, and ſweeter, / And greater, / Than dull Tea with Nancy.
ref: 1719, T[homas] d’Urfey, “The Toper. The Jolly Toper, that wont Leave His Bottle to Get the Best Wife in Christendom.”, in Wit and Mirth: Or Pills to Purge Melancholy; […], volume II, London: Printed by W. Pearson, for J[acob] Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 163:
text: But, as ill tongues are never wanting to disturb the repose of honest families, there was such a tattle about my wife going to dress the corregidor's victuals, make his bed, and the like, that all the town rang of it.
ref: 1876, anonymous [Diego Hurtado de Mendoza?], chapter XX, in The Spanish Comic Novel, Lazarillo de Tormes, Glasgow: John Calder & Co., […], →OCLC, page 43:
glosses: Idle talk; gossip; (countable) an instance of such talk or gossip.
Synonyms: sense: tattletale
word: telltale tit
word: informant
word: gossiper
word: chatter
word: clatfart
word: goss
word: gossip
word: gossipry
word: labrish
word: scuttlebutt
word: skeet
word: tale
word: tattle
word: tidbit
word: tittle-tattle
word: twittle-twattle
Hypernyms: word: chatter
word: hearsay
Related terms: word: snitches get stitches
word: twattle
word: gossip column
word: hoax
word: indiscretion
word: lie
word: rumour
word: slander
word: scandal sheet
word: slambook
word: tab
word: tabloid
word: yellow press
word: gossiper