Word.ws English Dictionary

dribbled

dribbled is the simple past and past participle of dribble.

Meaning of dribble

Verb

dribble (third-person singular simple present dribbles, present participle dribbling, simple past and past participle dribbled)

  1. In various ball games, to move (with) the ball, controlling its path by kicking or bouncing it repeatedly.
  2. To let saliva drip from the mouth; to drool.
    • The baby dribbled onto its bib.
  3. (intransitive) To fall in drops or an unsteady stream; to trickle.
  4. (figuratively, intransitive) To move or roll slowly or in small quantities.
    • The last formal word of compliment was spoken and the audience dribbled away with a sense of having performed a duty only slightly less meritorious than that of going to church.1927, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], Max Carrados Mysteries
  5. (transitive) To let something fall in drips.
    • let her [the cook] follow him softly with a ladle full, and dribble it all the way up stairs to the dining-room1731 (date written; published 1745), [Jonathan] Swift, Directions to Servants […], London: […] R[obert] Dodsley, […], and M. Cooper, […], →OCLC
  6. (dated) To live or pass one's time in a trivial fashion.

See all 13 meanings of dribble

Questions about dribbled

What is dribbled the simple past and past participle of?
Dribbled is the simple past and past participle of dribble.

Words near dribbled in the dictionary

  1. dribbers
  2. dribbing
  3. dribble
  4. dribble glass
  5. dribble glasses
  6. dribbled
  7. dribbler
  8. dribblers
  9. dribbles
  10. dribblesome
  11. dribblet

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dribbled (page history and authors); dribble (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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Cite this entry: “dribbled.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dribbled. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.