lalla

See also: Lalla

English

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

lalla (plural lallas)

(historical) In Persia, a kind of domestic tutor.
(historical) In Persia, a male nurse.
(India, historical) A native clerk who writes the vernacular.
(India, historical) A respectable merchant.
- 1841, Society in India, ii. 176:
  Where there are no tigers, the Lalla (scribe) becomes a shikaree.
- 1935, Mulk Raj Anand, Untouchable:
  There were Hindu lallas from the piece-goods market of Bulandshahr, smartly dressed in silks; there were Kashmiri Muhammadans from the local carpet factories, immaculately clad in white cotton; […]

Henry Yule, Arthur Burnell (1903) Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases

-lálla

lalla (present lallar, preterite lallade, supine lallat, imperative lalla)

to sing without words, to la-la
lalla med i en melodi
la-la along to a melody
(colloquial, often with runt (“around”)) to not be (appropriately) serious
Sluta lalla runt på plan!
Get serious on the field!

Han lallade in en timme för sent
He wandered ("la-la'd") in an hour late

Två vilsna turister lallade in på plan
Two lost tourists ambled ("la-la'd") onto the playing field
to talk nonsense, to be dopey

Compare Moroccan Arabic لالة (lady, “lālla”). (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

lalla f (Tifinagh spelling ⵍⴰⵍⵍⴰ, usually uncountable)