Word.ws English Dictionary

daddle

UK/ˈdædəɫ/

daddle verb: to walk unsteadily; totter; dawdle.

Verb

daddle (third-person singular simple present daddles, present participle daddling, simple past and past participle daddled)

  1. (archaic, dialectal, intransitive) To walk unsteadily; totter; dawdle
    • I had to wait an hour at the station for the coming of his train. It was passed pleasantly in reading, ' The Victory Won,' an interesting narrative of the salvation of a sceptical physician. When uncle arrived, he and I daddled along a pretty narrow lane.1869, Thomas Collins, The life of the rev. Thos. Collins
  2. To diddle (cheat)
    • "Thunder!" he cried. "A week! I can't do that; they'd have the black spot on me by then. The lubbers is going about to get the wind of me this blessed moment; lubbers as couldn't keep what they got, and want to nail what is another's. Is that seamanly behavior, now, I want to know? But I'm a saving...1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC

Noun

daddle (plural daddles)

  1. (obsolete, slang) The hand or fist; used in the phrase "tip us your daddle" meaning "give me your hand".

Forms of daddle

Verb
third-person singular presentdaddles
present participledaddling
past participledaddled
pastdaddled
alternative Northern Englanddadle
alternative Northern Englanddauldle
alternative Northern Englanddawdle
Noun
pluraldaddles

Origin of daddle

Probably dade + -le. Compare English doddle.

Words formed from daddle

Phrases with daddle

Questions about daddle

What does daddle mean?
Daddle means to walk unsteadily; totter; dawdle.
What part of speech is daddle?
Daddle can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce daddle?
Daddle is pronounced /ˈdædəɫ/ (UK).
What is the past tense of daddle?
The past tense of daddle is daddled.

Words near daddle in the dictionary

  1. daddio
  2. daddios
  3. daddish
  4. daddishly
  5. daddishness
  6. daddle
  7. daddled
  8. daddles
  9. daddling
  10. daddock
  11. daddocks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: daddle (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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