fiddle
pronunciation
How to pronounce fiddle in British English:
UK [ˈfɪdl]
How to pronounce fiddle in American English:
US [ˈfɪdl]
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- Noun:
- bowed stringed instrument that is the highest member of the violin family; this instrument has four strings and a hollow body and an unfretted fingerboard and is played with a bow
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- Verb:
- avoid (one's assigned duties)
- commit fraud and steal from one's employer
- play the violin or fiddle
- play on a violin
- manipulate manually or in one's mind or imagination
- play around with or alter or falsify, usually secretively or dishonestly
- try to fix or mend
Word Origin
- fiddle
- fiddle: [OE] Like its distant cousin violin, fiddle comes ultimately from the name of a Roman goddess of joy and victory. This was Vītula, who probably originated among the pre-Roman Sabine people of the Italian peninsula. A Latin verb was coined from her name, vītulārī, meaning ‘hold joyful celebrations’, which in post-classical times produced the noun vītula ‘stringed instrument, originally as played at such festivals’.In the Romance languages this went on to give viola, violin, etc, but prehistoric West and North Germanic borrowed it as *fithulōn, whence German fiedel, Dutch vedel, and English fiddle. In English, the word has remained in use for the instrument which has developed into the modern violin, but since the 16th century it has gradually been replaced as the main term by violin, and it is now only a colloquial or dialectal alternative.The sense ‘swindle’ originated in the USA in the mid-to-late 19th century.=> violin
- fiddle (n.)
- "stringed musical instrument, violin," late 14c., fedele, fydyll, fidel, earlier fithele, from Old English fiðele "fiddle," which is related to Old Norse fiðla, Middle Dutch vedele, Dutch vedel, Old High German fidula, German Fiedel "a fiddle;" all of uncertain origin. The usual suggestion, based on resemblance in sound and sense, is that it is from Medieval Latin vitula "stringed instrument" (source of Old French viole, Italian viola), which perhaps is related to Latin vitularia "celebrate joyfully," from Vitula, Roman goddess of joy and victory, who probably, like her name, originated among the Sabines [Klein, Barnhart]. Unless the Medieval Latin word is from the Germanic ones. FIDDLE, n. An instrument to tickle human ears by friction of a horse's tail on the entrails of a cat. [Ambrose Bierce, "The Cynic's Word Book," 1906] Fiddle has been relegated to colloquial usage by its more proper cousin, violin, a process encouraged by phraseology such as fiddlesticks (1620s), contemptuous nonsense word fiddle-de-dee (1784), and fiddle-faddle. Century Dictionary reports that fiddle "in popular use carries with it a suggestion of contempt and ridicule." Fit as a fiddle is from 1610s.
- fiddle (v.)
- late 14c., "play upon a fiddle," from fiddle (n.); the figurative sense of "to act nervously, make idle movements, move the hands or something held in them in an idle, ineffective way" is from 1520s. Related: Fiddled; fiddling.
Example
- 1. You have to play your strengths like a fiddle if you are to succeed in business .
- 2. This does not include time spent listening to the mandolin , the fiddle or the ukulele .
- 3. Full disclosure would also help spot the people who are on the fiddle .
- 4. I once asked anne-sophie mutter , the great violinist , what had made her choose the fiddle .
- 5. But it 's also a story of how a father created a legacy with his grandfather 's fiddle and passed a baton to his son so that his son could fulfill his dreams .