raggle-taggle
untidy, disorganized
TRANSLATION
raggle-taggle = ungepflegt, schmuddelig, heruntergekommen --- Google Index: ca. 231,000 hits
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
Martin, a volunteer from Cologne with the No Borders group, curses the Red Cross for going home at 4pm and not turning up till 8am, leaving his RAGGLE-TAGGLE band of anarchists and idealists to serve hot drinks and food all night, and distribute warm clothes to the new arrivals.
BBC News
---
They are a RAGGLE-TAGGLE army of have-nots, but they embody the new spirit of our nation.
The Guardian
BBC News
---
They are a RAGGLE-TAGGLE army of have-nots, but they embody the new spirit of our nation.
The Guardian
Did you
know?
raggle-taggle
adjective phrase
untidy and scruffy
(Oxford Dictionary)
- - -
A rag is a piece of cloth, usually from torn up clothing that is no longer worth wearing. A tag is a very small bit of cloth that may be found hanging from clothing. Possibly because the words rhyme nicely, they were combined in the late 1600s into "rag tag" or "raggle-taggle" to refer to a somewhat torn and dirty clothing, and similarly, to the people who wear such clothes.
"The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy" is a traditional English and Irish folk song about a wealthy noblewoman who falls in love with a gypsy. She then runs off with the handsome stranger. When her husband asks the servants where his wife is, they reply: "She’s away with the raggle-taggle gypsy-o".
The British expression "rag, tag and bobtail" also refers to a group of rather dirty and poor people. In the 1700s the terms "tagrag" or "tag and rag" were also common.
Using the word "rags" to refer to torn and dirty clothing can be found in another idiom, too. Particularly in the US, the phrase "rags to riches" means that a person has gone from being poor to being wealthy.
- - -
SYNONYMS
untidy, scruffy, motley, disorganized
---
SMUGGLE OWAD into today's conversation:
"Turning up RAGGLE-TAGGLE to an interview is no way to get a job"
adjective phrase
untidy and scruffy
(Oxford Dictionary)
- - -
A rag is a piece of cloth, usually from torn up clothing that is no longer worth wearing. A tag is a very small bit of cloth that may be found hanging from clothing. Possibly because the words rhyme nicely, they were combined in the late 1600s into "rag tag" or "raggle-taggle" to refer to a somewhat torn and dirty clothing, and similarly, to the people who wear such clothes.
"The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy" is a traditional English and Irish folk song about a wealthy noblewoman who falls in love with a gypsy. She then runs off with the handsome stranger. When her husband asks the servants where his wife is, they reply: "She’s away with the raggle-taggle gypsy-o".
The British expression "rag, tag and bobtail" also refers to a group of rather dirty and poor people. In the 1700s the terms "tagrag" or "tag and rag" were also common.
Using the word "rags" to refer to torn and dirty clothing can be found in another idiom, too. Particularly in the US, the phrase "rags to riches" means that a person has gone from being poor to being wealthy.
- - -
SYNONYMS
untidy, scruffy, motley, disorganized
---
SMUGGLE OWAD into today's conversation:
"Turning up RAGGLE-TAGGLE to an interview is no way to get a job"
