fiddler

See also: Fiddler

English

Etymology

From Middle English fithelere, from Old English fiþelere, from *fiþele. By surface analysis, fiddle +‎ -er.

(capstan-house): So called because the fiddle would sometimes be played to cheer the sailors working there.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈfɪdələ(ɹ)/, /ˈfɪdlə(ɹ)/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

fiddler (plural fiddlers)

1. One who plays the fiddle.
2. One who fiddles; a cheat.
   • 2005, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, The drama of my life (in The Independent online, [1])

     We were the self-controlled, cautious, nifty merchants, decorous fiddlers of accounts, hoarders of wealth, excellent bribers, family and community creatures governed by manners.

3. One who fiddles or tweaks.
   • 2012, Fiorenza Belussi, Udo Hermann Staber, Managing Networks of Creativity, page 92:

     The community of radio amateurs—trespassing fiddlers on the cutting edge of technological possibilities—prefigured the geek community that was to inhabit Silicon Valley 50 years later.

4. A burrowing crab of the genus Gelasimus, of many species. The male has one claw very much enlarged, and often holds it in a position similar to that in which a musician holds a fiddle.
5. The common European sandpiper (Actitis hypoleucos); so called because it habitually wags its tail up and down resembling the back and forth movement of a fiddler.
6. A large species of cicada, Macrotristria angularis, of eastern Australia; cherry nose.
7. (UK, slang, obsolete) A coin of little value: a sixpence or a farthing.
8. (nautical, slang) The capstan-house on a steamer.
   • 1877, Official Guide and Album of the Cunard Steamship Company, page 95:

     Whereupon you shake hands with him […] and make room for him by your side in the "Fiddler," when the pleasant time of night is come, and the stewardess is tucking up the ladies, and putting oranges and other goodies under their pillows, and the menfolk assemble in the capstan house to smoke their last cigar.

Synonyms

• fiddlist, fiddleist (both dated)

Derived terms

• bass fiddler
• bull fiddler
• drunk as a fiddler
• fiddler crab
• Fiddler on the Roof
• Fiddler's Ferry
• Hardanger fiddler
• kiddy fiddler
• pay the fiddler

 

Translations

one who plays the fiddle

• Bulgarian: цигулар m (cigular)
• Czech: houslista (cs) m
• Danish: spillemand
• Dutch: vedelaar (nl) m, speelman (nl) m
• Finnish: viulisti (fi)
• Georgian: მევიოლინე (mevioline)
• German: Geiger (de) m
• Hungarian: hegedűs (hu)
• Irish: fidléir m
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: spellemann m, spillemann m

  Nynorsk: spelemann m

• Ottoman Turkish: كامنچه‌جی (kemençeci)
• Polish: skrzypek (pl) m
• Portuguese: rabequista m or f, rabequeiro m
• Russian: скрипа́ч (ru) m (skripáč)
• Scottish Gaelic: fìdhlear m
• Swedish: fiolspelman c, spelman (sv) c

References

• (capstan-house): John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary

Anagrams

• Friddle