tchotchke
Syllables: tchotch·keUK/ˈt͡ʃɒt͡ʃkə//ˈt͡ʃɑt͡ʃkə/
tchotchke noun: a small ornament of minor value; a knick-knack, a trinket.
Noun
tchotchke (plural tchotchkes)
- A small ornament of minor value; a knick-knack, a trinket.
- We're stuck with: 14 Provincial & Modern Kitchen chairs— […] 23 assorted Lamps and miscellaneous "Tchotchkes"! Help us unload.1957 September 18, “You’re often sorry later when you don’t—plan ahead [Affiliated Home Distributors advertisement]”, in Citizen-News, Valley edition, volume 53, number 147, Hollywood, Los Angeles...
- Barbra Streisand's ambition: to open a knick-knack shop called "Tchotchkes" (Yiddish for "knick-knacks") …[1969 November 10, Earl Wilson, “Names make news items”, in J. Ray Hunt, editor, Philadelphia Daily News, volume XLV, number 190, Philadelphia, Pa.: Triangle Publications, →OCLC, page 45, column 1
- Synonyms:
- bauble, novelty, bric-a-brac, fandangle, fangle, fizgig, folderol, gewgaw, kickshaw, knick-knack
- An attractive girl or woman.
- My mother is still convinced that her little boy doesn't eat enough (I've gained 15 pounds the last six months), and that he doesn't get enough sleep (I average a good nine hours a night), […] She is always giving me advice, chiding me for the error of my ways, warning me not to drive too fast, and...[1947 December 15, Sydney J[ustin] Harris, “Strictly Personal: Harris says offspring always children to mom”, in Waterloo Daily Courier, volume 89, number 298, Waterloo, Iowa: W. H. Hartman Company...
- He looked Elinor over appraisingly as she seated herself on the banquette between him and Jake. "A real tsatskeh," he said with approval.1970, Stanley Ellin, chapter 19, in The Bind, New York, N.Y.: Random House, →OCLC, page 94
Examples of tchotchke in a sentence
- With limited cash and a thirst for uncommon sights, backpackers have pushed into challenging territory well before the big-money resorts or tchotchke merchants.1999 August 8, Jesse McKinley, “The avant-garde: Follow that backpack”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company...
- And a good place to pillage or barter tchotchkes.”2022 July 26, William Meny & Paul Simms, “The Night Market” (5:01 from the start), in What We Do in the Shadows, season 4, episode 4...
- Traveling from slick AI showrooms to warehouses full of holiday tchotchkes, Ann Scott Tyson found optimism, nimbleness, and resilience – even in the face of U.S. sanctions.2025 December 29, Ann Scott Tyson, “In 2025, China proved its innovation prowess. But are some workers getting left behind?”, in The...
- The Business Section of the admirable New York Times once published advertisements that showed a full-bosomed tchotchke in a very skimpy bra and panties leaning forward invitingly.1978, Leo [Calvin] Rosten, “The Glories of the Press”, in Passions & Prejudices: Or, Some of My Best Friends are People, New York, N.Y....
Synonyms of tchotchke
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of tchotchke
| plural | tchotchkes |
|---|---|
| alternative form | chachka |
| alternative form | chatchka |
| alternative form | chatchke |
| alternative form | chotchke |
| alternative form | tsatske |
| alternative form | tshatshke |
| alternative form | tsotchke |
Origin of tchotchke
Borrowed from Yiddish טשאַטשקע (tshatshke, “ornament; trinket; toy; (figurative) attractive girl or woman”), from a Slavic language and probably ultimately imitative of a baby’s utterances. Slavic cognates * Polish cacko (“toy; knick-knack, trinket; pretty thing”), from caca (“nice thing”), and czaczko (“(obsolete) toy; trinket; pretty thing”) * Russian ца́цка (cácka, “(informal) knick-knack, trinket; (dated) toy”), from ца́ца (cáca, “toy; trinket; well-behaved child; nice person; conceited person”) * Ukrainian ца́цка (cácka, “(dated) toy; ornament, trinket; conceited person; well-dressed person”), from ца́ца (cáca, “toy; well-behaved child; conceited person; attractive woman”)
Questions about tchotchke
- What does tchotchke mean?
- Tchotchke means a small ornament of minor value; a knick-knack, a trinket.
- How do you use tchotchke in a sentence?
- With limited cash and a thirst for uncommon sights, backpackers have pushed into challenging territory well before the big-money resorts or tchotchke merchants.
- What part of speech is tchotchke?
- Tchotchke is a noun.
- How do you pronounce tchotchke?
- Tchotchke is pronounced /ˈt͡ʃɒt͡ʃkə/ (UK).
- What is the plural of tchotchke?
- The plural of tchotchke is tchotchkes.
Words near tchotchke in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: tchotchke (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-tchotchke.ogg.
Cite this entry: “tchotchke.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/tchotchke. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.