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fiddle

[fid-l]

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noun

a musical instrument of the viol family.

violin: Her aunt plays first fiddle with the state symphony orchestra.

Nautical. a small ledge or barrier raised in heavy weather to keep dishes, pots, utensils, etc., from sliding off tables and stoves.

British Informal. swindle; fraud.

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verb (used without object)

to play on the fiddle.

to make trifling or fussing movements with the hands (often followed by with): fiddling with his cuffs.

to touch or manipulate something, as to operate or adjust it; tinker (often followed by with): You may have to fiddle with the antenna to get a clear picture on the TV.

to waste time; trifle; dally (often followed by around): Stop fiddling around and get to work.

British Informal. to cheat.

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Fiddle is one of our favorite verbs.

So is skedaddle. Does it mean:

to expurgate (a written work) by removing or modifying passages considered vulgar or objectionable.

to run away hurriedly; flee.

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verb (used with object)

10.

to play (a tune) on a fiddle.

11.

to trifle or waste (usually used with away): to fiddle time away.

12.

Bookbinding. to bind together (sections or leaves of a book) by threading a cord through holes cut lengthwise into the back.

13.

British Informal.

to falsify: to fiddle the account books.

to cheat: to fiddle the company out of expense money.

Idioms

14.

fine as a fiddle, South Midland and Southern U.S. fiddle (def. 15).

15.

fit as a fiddle, in perfect health; very fit: The doctor told him he was fit as a fiddle. Also, as fit as a fiddle.

16.

play second fiddle. second fiddle.

Origin:
before 1000; Middle English; Old English fithele (cognate with German Fiedel, Dutch vedel, Old High German fidula) probably < Vulgar Latin *vītula (compare viol, viola¹), perhaps derivative of Latin vītulārī to rejoice

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To fiddle

Example Sentences

Some tunes alternated unison and harmony playing, the fiddle lines fanning out in a burst of consonance.

The ability to keep on cashing out is what tempted some to fiddle the books.

Some may fiddle with color to make flowers on a greeting card look extra-bright.

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Some tunes alternated unison and harmony playing, the fiddle lines fanning out in a burst of consonance.

The ability to keep on cashing out is what tempted some to fiddle the books.

Some may fiddle with color to make flowers on a greeting card look extra-bright.

But imagine if you could sleep for five months and still wake up fit as a fiddle.

But not all filmmakers had the time or budget to fiddle around with dinosaur models.

They experiment, fiddle around and often have fewer restrictions on what they think is possible.

Lytro's website lets visitors fiddle with existing images to see how some of these features will work.

Singing traditional tales and improvised poems while playing the rababa fiddle at weddings.

Everybody has to fiddle with six different standards.

Their songs ran the gamut in styles, everything from mountain ballads to fiddle tunes and railroad blues.

Indeed, there's much to be said for not having to fiddle with a focus dial every time you move the projector half an inch.

Monsanto is also using genetic engineering to fiddle around with non-agricultural products.

The musicians are joined by two boys on fiddle and banjo.

Tell all the tall stories and fiddle with the statistics all you want.

And that's hardly something to fiddle dee dee about.

Watching him fiddle with the dials on multiple propane canisters, you can see that displaying a sculpture might be tricky.

Innovators are also inveterate experimenters, who fiddle with both their products and their business models.

Gillie's authentic style of singing can be sampled in accappella, with her guitar accompaniement and with fiddle and bousouki.

Handbrake offers settings to crop the black bars, but you shouldn't fiddle with them.

By law it must report twice a year on which countries fiddle their exchange rates at the world's expense.

At the top of a ridge, as bikers roll by, he stops to fiddle with a radio receiver.

It also wants to fiddle with its workers' pensions and health care.

So is the government's childish attempt to fiddle the country's economic statistics.

It will probably use the legal fiddle it used six weeks ago and suspend it for a further six weeks.

At the moment, these are disposed of by yet another mathematical fiddle.

Eurocrats fiddle over their representation on international bodies as the euro burns.

It is easier to reduce interest rates in a timely way than to fiddle with tax schedules.

So, fiddle with the atmospheres of these neighbours and you open new frontiers for human settlement and far-fetched story lines.

And in some ways technology has made it much easier to fiddle and fix.

So after another fiddle on the computer you print a second pair.

Letting kith and kin fiddle with focus online may not be enough to fuel demand.

They were known to fiddle while everything important burned.

The four women ingeniously entangle and untangle themselves around her in a moving square to the sound of a fiddle.

Sometimes you have to fiddle with the sound settings on your computer.

One can fiddle away on these rules trying to refine them and catch border cases, but it never really pans out.

Officials are tempted to fiddle with state pension laws rather than honestly explain to voters that tax cuts must be paid for.

It takes a special kind of partner to be willing to play second fiddle for your time on a long-term basis.

No more awkward stage banter as you fiddle with your tuning pedal between songs at a gig.

Marine reptiles long played second fiddle to their more famous cousins, the dinosaurs.

In his later performances he would often keep time for himself by clog dancing while he sang and played the fiddle or banjo.

But these strategic reasons for taking on debt may have played second fiddle to a more basic motive: managers' self-interest.

If you're a stickler for quality, the software lets you fiddle with bitrates and.

He was not the first or last to fiddle with the spelling or pronunciation of this fairly important noun and verb.

D'Attili has been the man to consult on whether a dusty fiddle in an attic or closet is centuries old and of.

Everyone sits around, waiting for one player to fiddle around with the tiles.

Headliners are among the best fiddle bands and solo fiddlers in the.

But there is also plainly a need to fiddle with some of the global political architecture.

Paco is to take the fiddle to a certain hotel where he will be paid by the contact.

The trade unions are playing the fiddle whilst the city is burning down around them.

Reporting vote totals by phone from polling stations to local radio stations makes it harder to fiddle the results later.

Sunnis have to accept that as the minority sect they will play second fiddle.

All these schemes are useless attempts to fiddle with housing demand without dealing with housing supply.

And that way seems to be to fiddle with the exchange rate.

They should know better than to fall behind the panic and fiddle while contagion looms.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

fiddle (ˈfɪd^əl)

—n
1.	informal any instrument of the viol or violin family, esp the violin
2.	a violin played as a folk instrument
3.	time-wasting or trifling behaviour; nonsense; triviality
4.	nautical a small railing around the top of a table to prevent objects from falling off it in bad weather
5.	informal (Brit) an illegal or fraudulent transaction or arrangement
6.	informal (Brit) a manually delicate or tricky operation
7.	informal at the fiddle, on the fiddle engaged in an illegal or fraudulent undertaking
8.	informal face as long as a fiddle a dismal or gloomy facial expression
9.	informal fit as a fiddle in very good health
10.	informal play second fiddle to be subordinate; play a minor part

—vb (often foll by with) (when intr, often foll by about or around)
11.	to play (a tune) on the fiddle
12.	to make restless or aimless movements with the hands
13.	informal to spend (time) or act in a careless or inconsequential manner; waste (time)
14.	informal (often foll by with) to tamper or interfere (with)
15.	informal to contrive to do (something) by illicit means or deception: he fiddled his way into a position of trust
16.	informal (tr) to falsify (accounts, etc); swindle

[Old English fithele, probably from Medieval Latin vītula, from Latin vītulārī to celebrate; compare Old High German fidula fiddle; see viola¹]

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

fiddle

O.E. fiðele, related to O.N. fiðla, M.Du. vedele, Ger. Fiedel; all probably from M.L. vitula "stringed instrument," perhaps related to L. vitularia "celebrate joyfully," from Vitula, Roman goddess of joy and victory, who probably, like her name, originated among the Sabines. The verb is from

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late 14c.; the figurative sense of "to act idly" is from 1520s. Related: Fiddling. The word has been relegated to colloquial usage by its more proper cousin, violin, a process encouraged by phraseology such as fiddlestick (15c., originally "the bow of a fiddle;" meaning "nonsense" is from 1620s) and fiddle-faddle (1570s), which is unrelated, being a reduplication of obsolete faddle "to trifle." Fit as a fiddle is from 1610s.

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American Heritage

Cultural Dictionary