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Dibble
Definitions
- 1 A surname originating as a patronymic.
- 1 A pointed implement used to make holes in the ground in which to set out plants or to plant seeds.
"Pol[ixenes] Then make you[r] Garden rich in Gilly'vors, / And do not call them baſtards. / Per[dita] Ile not put / The Dible in earth, to ſet one ſlip of them: […]"
- 2 A police officer, especially one serving with Greater Manchester Police. British, countable, slang
"Remember this story about police hunting a metal detector enthusiast suspected of digging 20 holes in a school playing field in Cornwall? It’s taken a rather unusual twist. Pop superstar Robbie Williams appears to have ’fessed up to the crime. The former Take That star, who is a keen metal detecting enthusiast, retweeted the West Briton newspaper’s version of the story, telling ‘Dibble’ – a Mancunian slang term for the police which comes from the character Officer Dibble in the cartoon Top Cat – to ‘do one’, vowing the police will never catch him alive."
- 3 a wooden hand tool with a pointed end; used to make holes in the ground for planting seeds or bulbs wordnet
- 4 Preceded by the: the police. British, slang, uncountable
"Watch out, lads! Here comes the dibble!"
- 1 To make holes or plant seeds using, or as if using, a dibble. transitive
"And as in winter, when the frost breaks up, / At winter's end, before the spring begins, / And a warm west wind blows, and thaw sets in— / After an hour a dripping sound is heard / In all the forests, and the soft-strewn snow / Under the trees is dibbled thick with holes, / And from the boughs the snowloads shuffle down; […]"
- 2 make a hole with a wooden hand tool wordnet
- 3 To use a dibble; to make holes in the soil. intransitive
"There is another method of ſowing wheat in rows uſed in ſome counties, which is termed dibbling in the language of agricultors, and consiſts in making perpendicular holes one inch and half or two inches deep, as is commonly done in planting potato-roots; theſe holes are made by a man, who has a proper ſtaff ſhod with iron in each hand, and as he walks backwards is able by looking at the part of the row already made to keep nearly in a ſtraight line, and to make two holes at once at about nine inches diſtant from each other every way."
- 4 plant with a wooden hand tool wordnet
- 5 To dib or dip frequently, as in angling. intransitive
"And neere to them ye see the lesser dibling Teale"
Etymology
Possibly dib (“to dab lightly”) + -le (frequentative suffix indicating repetition or continuousness); however, the word dibble is attested earlier than dib.
Possibly dib (“to dab lightly”) + -le (frequentative suffix indicating repetition or continuousness); however, the word dibble is attested earlier than dib.
From the character of Officer Charlie Dibble, a New York Police Department officer, in the Hanna-Barbera cartoon series Top Cat (first broadcast in the US in 1961, and in the UK in 1962 under the title Boss Cat).
From a Middle English form of the given name Theobald.
See also for "dibble"
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Unscramble this word: dibble