higgledy-piggledy


unstructured, chaotic

TRANSLATION

higgledy-piggledy = drunter und drüber, kreuz und quer, durcheinander

STATISTICS

IN THE PRESS

“The world’s governing structures are HIGGLEDY-PIGGLEDY: disorderly, heads and tails in any or every direction.”

Ralph C. Bryant - 'Governance for a Higgledy-Piggledy Planet'

Did you
know?

higgledy-piggledy
reduplicative adjective phrase

- in a confused, disordered, or random manner

Merriam-Webster


ORIGIN

Edward Moor, in “Suffolk Words and Phrases” (London, 1823), quotes a list of “conceited rhyming words or reduplications” from the 1768 edition of John Ray’s “Collection of English Words Not Generally Used”, all said to “signify any confusion or mixture”.

The list has higgledy-piggledy, hurly-burly, hodge-podge, mingle-mangle, arsy-versy, kim-kam, hub-bub, crawly-mauly, and hab-nab.

“To which he might have added”, Moor writes, crincum-crankum, crinkle-crankle, flim-flam, fiddle-faddle, gibble-gabble, harum-scarum, helter-skelter, hiccup-suickup, hocus-pocus, hotch-potch, hugger-mugger, humdrum, hum-strum, hurry-scurry, jibber-jabber, prittle-prattle, shilly-shally, tittle-tattle, and topsy-turvy. Many of these date from the 16th century.

Adapted from: The Etymology Dictionary


English has four types of reduplication:

(1) RHYMING reduplication: hokey-pokey, razzle-dazzle, super-duper, boogie-woogie, teenie-weenie, walkie-talkie, hoity-toity, wingding, ragtag, easy-peasy, hurdy-gurdy.

(2) EXACT reduplications (baby-talk-like): bye-bye, choo-choo, night-night, no-no, pee-pee, poo-poo.

(3) ABLAUT (vowel) reduplications: chit-chat, hip-hop, ding-dong, jibber-jabber, kitty-cat, knick-knack, pitter-patter, splish-splash, zig-zag, flimflam, wibble-wobble.

(4) SHM-reduplication can be used with most any word; e.g. baby-shmaby, sale-shmale, apple-schmapple, fancy-shmancy. This process is a feature of American English from Yiddish, starting among the American Jews of New York City, then becoming New York dialect, and then out to the whole country.


SMUGGLE OWAD into a conversation today, say something like:

“Jim’s office was full of boxes, files and folders piled HIGGLEDY-PIGGLEDY on top of each other."


HERZLICHEN DANK to all readers helping me keep OWAD alive with single or monthly donations at:

https://donorbox.org/please-become-a-friend-of-owad-3

Paul Smith

More Word Quizzes:

redolent

2 years ago

sleepy

SORRY,
please try again...

aromatic

Congrats Your Answer is Correct.

arrogant

SORRY,
please try again...

the hands-down winner

2 years ago

wins very easily, with little effort

Congrats Your Answer is Correct.

wins, but only with great difficulty

SORRY,
please try again...

wins, and then immediately loses

SORRY,
please try again...

Comirnaty

2 years ago

covid-19 vaccine

Congrats Your Answer is Correct.

birthplace nostalgia

SORRY,
please try again...

tribal community

SORRY,
please try again...

cornucopia

2 years ago

a large amount

Congrats Your Answer is Correct.

the land of sleep

SORRY,
please try again...

a winding mountain road

SORRY,
please try again...

scot-free

2 years ago

the lowest price possible

SORRY,
please try again...

the price of whisky before tax

SORRY,
please try again...

an escape from punishment

Congrats Your Answer is Correct.

Copyright © 2023 - OWAD. All Rights Reserved.