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haggle

 - 3 dictionary results

hag⋅gle

  [hag-uhl] verb, -gled, -gling, noun
Use haggle in a Sentence
–verb (used without object)
1. to bargain in a petty, quibbling, and often contentious manner: They spent hours haggling over the price of fish.
2. to wrangle, dispute, or cavil: The senators haggled interminably over the proposed bill.
–verb (used with object)
3. to mangle in cutting; hack.
4. to settle on by haggling.
5. Archaic. to harass with wrangling or haggling.
–noun
6. the act of haggling; wrangle or dispute over terms.
Origin:
1275–1325; ME haggen to cut, chop (< ON hǫggva to hew ) + -le

Related forms:
haggler, noun
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To haggle
hag·gle   (hāg'əl)   
v.   hag·gled, hag·gling, hag·gles

v.   intr.

  1. To bargain, as over the price of something; dicker: "He preferred to be overcharged than to haggle" (W. Somerset Maugham).

  2. To argue in an attempt to come to terms.

v.   tr.

  1. To cut (something) in a crude, unskillful manner; hack.

  2. Archaic To harass or worry by wrangling.

n.  An instance of bargaining or arguing.

[Frequentative of dialectal hag, to chop, hack, from Middle English haggen, from Old Norse höggva; see kau- in Indo-European roots.]
hag'gler n.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Word Origin & History

haggle 
1577, "to cut unevenly" (implied in haggler), freq. of haggen "to chop" (see hack (1)). Sense of "argue about price" first recorded 1602, probably from notion of chopping away.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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