fiddle
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈfɪd(ə)l/
enpr: fĭdʹl
ipa: /ˈfɪdl̩/
ipa: [ˈfɪɾl̩]
rhymes: -ɪdəl
Forms: form: fiddles
form: fiddling
form: fiddled
form: fiddled
Etymology: From Middle English fithele, from Old English *fiþele, from Proto-West Germanic *fiþulā, from Proto-Germanic *fiþulǭ (“fiddle”), of uncertain etymology. Some contest that the Germanic terms are borrowed variations of Late Latin vitula (see viola); others contest that the word has a separate origin within Germanic languages, and still others believe that the Late Latin term for the stringed instrument is a borrowing from Germanic as a change of Latin t to Germanic þ is highly improbable, yet Germanic þ to Latin t is well documented (see troop, Teobaldo, etc.). Cognate with Old High German fidula (German Fiedel), Middle Dutch vedele (Dutch vedel, veel), Old Norse fiðla (Icelandic fiðla, Danish fiddel, Norwegian fela, Swedish fela).
The change from /ðl/ to /dl/ in modern English is regular; compare Bedlam, staddle, swaddle (in brothel, it was prevented; see that entry for discussion).
Senses: examples: text: to fiddle while Rome burns
text: Themistocles […] said he could not fiddle, but yet he could make a small town a great city.
ref: 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of the True Greatness of Kingdoms and Estates”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC:
glosses: To play the fiddle or violin, particularly in a folk or country style.
examples: text: Fred was sacked when the auditors caught him fiddling the books.
glosses: To fraudulently manipulate (records, accounts, etc.) in order to cheat or swindle.
examples: text: Sit up straight and stop fiddling!
text: Loke you fydell nat with your handes whan your maister speketh to you.
ref: 1530, John Palsgrave, Lesclarcissement, page 549:
text: […] talking, and fiddling with their hats and feathers […]
ref: 1663 July 23 (date written; Gregorian calendar), Samuel Pepys, Mynors Bright, transcriber, “July 13th, 1663”, in Henry B[enjamin] Wheatley, editor, The Diary of Samuel Pepys […], volume III, London: George Bell & Sons […]; Cambridge: Deighton Bell & Co., published 1893, →OCLC:
text: Yossarian went along in Milo Minderbinder's speeding M & M staff car to police headquarters to meet a swarthy, untidy police commissioner with a narrow black mustache and unbuttoned tunic who was fiddling with a stout woman with warts and two chins when they entered his office and who greeted Milo with warm surprise and bowed and scraped in obscene servility as though Milo were some elegant marquis.
ref: 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Eternal City”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 425:
glosses: To fidget or play; to fuss; to idly amuse oneself, to act aimlessly, idly, or frivolously, particularly out of nervousness or restlessness; see also fiddle with.
examples: text: I don't exactly know how to fix this lawnmower; I'm really just fiddling.
coordinate_terms: fettle
glosses: Synonym of tinker (“to make small adjustments or improvements”); see also fiddle with.
synonyms: word: tinker
extra: (“to make small adjustments or improvements”); see also fiddle with
examples: text: A cake-seller told me that a little while before I saw him a lad of twelve or so had consumed a shilling’s worth of cakes and pastry, as he had got a shilling by “fiddling;” not, be it understood, by the exercise of any musical skill, for “fiddling,” among the initiated, means the holding of horses, or the performing of any odd jobs.
ref: 1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, published 1861:
glosses: To do odd jobs for money.
Derived terms: sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle about
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle around
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle away
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddlefart
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddlefuck
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddler
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle the books
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle while Rome burns
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: fiddle with
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: refiddle
sense: terms derived from fiddle (verb)
word: twiddle