Word.ws English Dictionary

shpilkes

/ˈʃpɪlkɪs/

shpilkes noun: a state of impatience, agitation, or anxiety.

Noun

shpilkes pl (plural only)

  1. (plural, plural-only) A state of impatience, agitation, or anxiety.
    • This job interview tomorrow gives me shpilkes.

Synonyms of shpilkes

Origin of shpilkes

Borrowed from Yiddish שפּילקעס (shpilkes, “needles”), ultimately from a Slavic term such as Polish szpilka, which comes from Italian spilla, from Late Latin spīnula (“little thorn”).

Questions about shpilkes

What does shpilkes mean?
Shpilkes means a state of impatience, agitation, or anxiety.
What part of speech is shpilkes?
Shpilkes is a noun.
How do you pronounce shpilkes?
Shpilkes is pronounced /ˈʃpɪlkɪs/.

Words near shpilkes in the dictionary

  1. shpg.
  2. shpiel
  3. shpiels
  4. Shpigel
  5. Shpigels
  6. shpilkes
  7. shpitzel
  8. shpitzels
  9. shpmt.
  10. shpmts.
  11. SHPO

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: shpilkes (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: “shpilkes.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/shpilkes. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.