tetchy
Syllables: tetch·y/ˈtɛt͡ʃi/
tetchy adjective: synonym of touchy: easily annoyed or irritated, peevish, testy, irascible; also (figurative) extremely sensitive, difficult to manage, use, or work.
Adjective
tetchy (comparative tetchier, superlative tetchiest)
- Synonym of touchy: easily annoyed or irritated, peevish, testy, irascible; also (figurative) extremely sensitive, difficult to manage, use, or work.
- Nurce: ...But as I said, when it did tast the wormwood on the nipple of my dug, & felt it bitter, pretty foole to see it teachie and fall out with Dugge...c. 1591–1595 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- King. And came I not at last to comfort you?
Du. No by the holie roode thou knowst it well,
Thou camst on earth to make the earth my hell,
A greuous burthen was thy berth to me,
Techie and waiward was thy infancie,
Thy schoele-daies frightful, desperate, wild, and furious.c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- Synonyms:
- touchy
tetchy meaning in Malayalam
tetchy in Malayalam
- cantankerous, irritable, irascible
- ശീഘ്രകോപിയായ, മുൻകോപിയായ, ശീഘ്രക്ഷോഭിയായ, ക്ഷിപ്രക്ഷോഭിയായ, പെട്ടെന്നു കോപിക്കുന്ന, മുൻകോപമുള്ള
Examples of tetchy in a sentence
- Our hart is so narrowly limited that (by euery little distaste) we are strangely altered, and being in this teasty tetchy way, presently we let flye foorth much vnseemelines.1605, “Chapter 6”, in Anthony Munday, transl., The Dumbe Diuine Speaker, London: William Leake, translation of original by Giacomo Affinati...
- I warrant, sir, he is, as you say, a very precise acrimonious person—A tetchy repugnant kind of old gentleman.1792, Thomas Holcroft, edited by J. Bragg, The Road to Ruin, Dublin, act 5, page 65:
- They’re good boys, as I said afore; but they’re quick and tetchy—George, being the youngest, nat’rally is the tetchiest.1887, Bret Harte, A Millionaire of Rough-and-Ready and Devil’s Ford, Devil’s Ford, page 238:
- He is like a tetchy housewife who wants you to recognise that everything is in perfect order in the middle of an eviction.1920, H. G. Wells, “Chapter 6”, in Russia in the Shadows:
Synonyms of tetchy
Forms of tetchy
| comparative | tetchier |
|---|---|
| superlative | tetchiest |
| alternative form | titchy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | techy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | techie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | teachy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | teachie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | teechy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tetchie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tecchy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | titchie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tichy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tertchy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tatchy |
| alternative form (obsolete) | tachy |
Origin of tetchy
Uncertain, first attested as teachie in the 1597 first quarto versions of Romeo and Juliet and Richard III. Perhaps coined by Shakespeare. Also variously derived from English tetch (“tantrum, fit of anger”); from Scots tache (“blotch, fault”); from Middle English tatch (“blemish”) &c. under influence from touchy.
Words formed from tetchy
Words that rhyme with tetchy
Questions about tetchy
- What does tetchy mean?
- Tetchy means synonym of touchy: easily annoyed or irritated, peevish, testy, irascible; also (figurative) extremely sensitive, difficult to manage, use, or work.
- What is tetchy in Malayalam?
- Tetchy in Malayalam is ശീഘ്രകോപിയായ, മുൻകോപിയായ, ശീഘ്രക്ഷോഭിയായ. See Tetchy meaning in Malayalam.
- How do you use tetchy in a sentence?
- Our hart is so narrowly limited that (by euery little distaste) we are strangely altered, and being in this teasty tetchy way, presently we let flye foorth much vnseemelines.
- What part of speech is tetchy?
- Tetchy is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce tetchy?
- Tetchy is pronounced /ˈtɛt͡ʃi/.
Words near tetchy in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: tetchy (page history and authors); tetchy (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). 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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-tetchy.wav.
Cite this entry: “tetchy.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/tetchy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.