Collywobbles
//ˈkɒlɪwɒb(ə)lz// noun, slang
noun, slang ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A stomach ache or an upset stomach. British, humorous, informal, plural, plural-only
"Petunia’s off school today with a touch of the collywobbles."
- 2 severe gastroenteritis of unknown etiology; characterized by severe colic and vomiting and diarrhea wordnet
- 3 Anxiety, fear, uneasiness. British, broadly, humorous, informal, plural, plural-only
"I don’t like walking through the forest at night. It gives me the collywobbles."
Example
More examples"Anna the chimney sweep was sitting at a dizzying height on the factory smokestack. Just looking up at her gave me the collywobbles."
Etymology
Probably from colic (“severe pains that grip the abdomen”) + wobble (“unsteady motion”). Alternatively, it has been suggested that the word derives from colly (“coal dust”) (in the sense of someone becoming ill from breathing in such dust), or that it is a corruption of cholera.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.