ducks and drakes
ducks and drakes noun: a pastime of throwing flat stones across water so as to make them bounce off the surface.
Noun
ducks and drakes (uncountable)
- A pastime of throwing flat stones across water so as to make them bounce off the surface.
- A kind of sport or play with an oister shell or stone throwne into the water, and making circles yer it sinke, etc. It is called a ducke and a drake, and a halfe-penie cake.1585, The nomenclator, or remembrancer of Adrianus Junius, John Higgins
- They sat on a pebbly bank. Suddenly he caught sight of a nice flat stone, and, jumping up, began to make ducks and drakes on the water.1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “chapter 7”, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […], →OCLC
- Synonyms:
- stone skipping, stone skimming, stone skiffing, drakestoning
- The squandering of resources, especially money; used in expressions such as "to make ducks and drakes of", "to play (at) ducks and drakes with".
- This royal Caesar doth regard no cash; Has thrown away as much in ducks and drakes As would have bought some 50,000 capons.1614, James Cooke, Tu Quoque
- Pendennis’s uncle, the Major, seldom does anything without me; and as he is likely to be extravagant we’ve tied up the property, so that he can’t make ducks and drakes with it.1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 59, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published...
- Synonyms:
- squandering, wasting
ducks and drakes meaning in Bengali
ducks and drakes in Bengali
- squandering
- ছিনিমিনি খেলা chinimini khela
Synonyms of ducks and drakes
Origin of ducks and drakes
1585, due to association with waterfowl. The precise origin is unclear, and may be from ducks taking off from a pond, or making rings when splashing, or bobbing their heads. Early references are primarily to “making” ducks and drakes, suggesting that the circular rings produced by the skipping stone resemble those created by splashing waterfowl. Sense “to squander, to throw away” shortly thereafter, attested 1614, from sense of “throwing money away, as if throwing stones away in this pastime”.
Words formed from ducks and drakes
- play ducks and drakes with
- make ducks and drakes of one's money
- drakestone
Questions about ducks and drakes
- What does ducks and drakes mean?
- Ducks and drakes means a pastime of throwing flat stones across water so as to make them bounce off the surface.
- What is ducks and drakes in Bengali?
- Ducks and drakes in Bengali is ছিনিমিনি খেলা (chinimini khela). See Ducks and drakes meaning in Bengali.
- What part of speech is ducks and drakes?
- Ducks and drakes is a noun.
Words near ducks and drakes in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: ducks and drakes (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: “ducks and drakes.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ducks_and_drakes. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.