different between dottle vs tottle

English

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?d?t?l/

Rhymes: -?t?l

Etymology 1

From Middle English dottel, dottelle (“a plug or tap of a vessel”), a diminutive of Old English dott (> English dot (“a point”)), equivalent to dot +? -le. Related to Old English dyttan (“to stop up, clot”), Dutch dot (“a knot, lump, clod”), Low German Dutte (“a plug”). More at dit.

Alternative forms

• dottel

Noun

dottle (plural dottles)

1. A plug or tap of a vessel.
2. A small rounded lump or mass.
3. The still burning or wholly burnt tobacco plug in a pipe.
   • 1957, Lawrence Durrell, Justine, Faber p. 96:

     one hand guards the burning dottle of my pipe from the force of the wind

   • 1981, John Gardner, Freddy's Book, Abacus 1982, p. 38:

     I clenched my pipe in my right fist and poked at the dottle busily with various fingers, first one then another, of my left hand.

   • 1984, Alan Dean Foster, The Hour of the Gate, page 89:

     He tapped out the dottle on the deck, locked the steering oar in position, and commenced repacking his pipe.
4. (Tyneside) A baby's dummy, pacifier.

Translations

References

• Newcastle 1970s, Scott Dobson and Dick Irwin, [1]
• Frank Graham (1987) The New Geordie Dictionary, ?ISBN
• Northumberland Words, English Dialect Society, R. Oliver Heslop, 1893–4

Etymology 2

Related to dote, dotard.

Adjective

dottle (comparative more dottle, superlative most dottle)

1. (Scotland) Stupid or senile.
   • 1893: David Herschell Edwards, One Hundred Modern Scottish Poets: With Biographical and Critical Notices, volume 15, page 403

     When days and years proclaim you’re old?—
     ?A dottle, cripple, gouty fellow,
     Then for support you can lay hold
     ?O’ the upright of your umberella.

Noun

dottle (plural dottles)

1. (Scotland) A dotard.

Synonyms

• dodipole, dotel; see also Thesaurus:dotard

Anagrams

• Dettol, lotted, tolted

English

Etymology 1

Compare toddle and totter.

Verb

tottle (third-person singular simple present tottles, present participle tottling, simple past and past participle tottled)

1. (colloquial, intransitive) To walk in a wavering, unsteady manner.
   • 1870, Mary Russell Mitford, Our Village: Sketches of Rural Character and Scenery

     I should not, however, so much mind if this folly [of giving children poetic names] were comprised in that domain of cold gentility, to which affectation usually confines itself. One does not regard seeing Miss Arabella seated at the piano, or her little sister Leonora tottling across the carpet to show her new pink shoes. That is in the usual course of events.

Etymology 2

From total.

Verb

tottle (third-person singular simple present tottles, present participle tottling, simple past and past participle tottled)

1. (archaic, dialect) To add up; to sum to a total.
   • 1902, Bram Stoker, The Mystery of the Sea (page 38)

     It may be that the days o' fine follow ane anither fast; or that the foul times linger likewise. But in the end, the figures of fine and foul tottle up, in accord wi' their ordered sum.

See also

• tot
• tot up

References

• 1873, John Camden Hotten, The Slang Dictionary