Tottle
name, noun, verb, slang ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 A container, generally of plastic, which is not a simple tube and which is kept with its cap down.
- 1 To walk in a wavering, unsteady manner. colloquial, intransitive
"I should not, however, so much mind if this folly [of giving children poetic names] were comprised in that domain of cold gentility, to which affectation usually confines itself. One does not regard seeing Miss Arabella seated at the piano, or her little sister Leonora tottling across the carpet to show her new pink shoes. That is in the usual course of events."
- 2 To add up; to sum to a total. archaic, dialectal
"It may be that the days o' fine follow ane anither fast; or that the foul times linger likewise. But in the end, the figures of fine and foul tottle up, in accord wi' their ordered sum."
- 1 A surname from Old English.
Example
More examples"I should not, however, so much mind if this folly [of giving children poetic names] were comprised in that domain of cold gentility, to which affectation usually confines itself. One does not regard seeing Miss Arabella seated at the piano, or her little sister Leonora tottling across the carpet to show her new pink shoes. That is in the usual course of events."
Etymology
Compare toddle and totter.
From total.
Blend of tube + bottle.
Perhaps a topographic surname for someone who lived by a hill used as a look-out station, from Old English tot (“look-out”) + hyll (“hill”).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.