tickle

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English tikelen,^[2][3][4] first recorded soon after 1300, beside the adjective tikel.^[5][6] Its origin is uncertain.^[5][4][7][6] The MED, Hoad and Barnhart take it as probably a frequentative formed from English tick (“to touch lightly”) + -le,^[2][8][4] as did Skeat;^[9] the OED notes that the chronology is against this, since that verb is recorded later than tickle, and that the earliest sense is a bodily feeling with no idea of light touching.^[5][4] Others take it as a metathesis of kittle,^{[5][7][10][11]} which Weekley also thought likely,^[12] beside German kitzeln and Old Norse kitla;^[5][4] but kittle too is attested later, except in the Old English verbal noun kitelung (“tickling”).^[5][4][6] Old English itself had tinclian (“to tickle”),^[5][4][6] which Barnhart compares with dialectal German zickeln,^[4] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged relates the word to it and probably to citelian (“to tickle”), Old High German kizzilōn and Old Norse kitla.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

To be stirred by a pleasant tingling or thrilling feeling, said of the heart, the blood and the like: about 1330, in Robert Mannyng's Chronicle.^[5][8] Etymonline finds the verb implied in tikeling about 1300,^[6] and the adjective tikel is recorded from about 1325.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The transitive sense "to please, gratify" appears in Chaucer's Wife of Bath's Prologue (about 1386), with the impersonal it tickleth me;^[5] Etymonline takes it as a rendering of Latin titillō.^[6] Chaucer used the verb only twice.^[14] The physical sense, to touch lightly so as to cause an itching or tingling, follows about 1450,^[5][8] and touching someone so as to make them laugh in 1530, in Palsgrave.^[5] From the 16th century the verb could also mean to tingle or itch (1542), to touch a stringed instrument lightly (1589) and, ironically, to beat (1592),^[5] and catching trout by hand is "tickling" in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.^[5] To tickle the fancy is dated by the OED from 1682^[5] and by Etymonline from the 1640s.^[6] The adjective tickle meant fickle and changeable, and later unsteady, easily overturned or precarious;^[5][7] Johnson (1755) defined it as "tottering; unfixed; unstable" and said he could not tell where it came from,^[15] and it lived on in general dialect use in Scotland, Ireland and England.^[16] The modern noun, an act of tickling, is recorded from 1801,^[5][13][4] although Middle English had tikel for sexual pleasure in the late 14th century.^[6] Along the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador a tickle is a narrow, difficult strait (from 1770), probably the same word.^[5][7] In slang it was a cat-o'-nine-tails in early Australia^[17] and a successful crime among British criminals from 1938.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 1325 – adjective tikel.^[5]
• c. 1330 – to be thrilled with pleasure (obsolete by 1642).^[5]
• c. 1386 – to please, gratify, in Chaucer.^[5]
• c. 1450 – to touch lightly so as to cause itching or tingling.^[5]
• 1530 – to touch so as to provoke laughter.^[5]
• 1542 – to itch or tingle.^[5]
• before 1616 – to catch trout by hand, in Shakespeare.^[5]
• 1682 – to amuse, as in to tickle the fancy.^[5]
• 1770 – noun, a narrow strait in Newfoundland and Labrador.^[5]
• 1801 – noun, an act of tickling or a tickling sensation.^[5][13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To touch, stroke or poke a person lightly, so as to cause laughter or a twitching feeling: Her brother tickled her feet until she begged him to stop.^[3][18][13]
2. To excite or stir pleasurably; to gratify.^[3][18][13]
3. To amuse or delight, often in tickle someone's fancy.^[18][3][5]
4. To itch or tingle: The wool scarf tickles.^[18][3][13]
5. To catch a fish, especially a trout, by stroking it gently with the hands.^[18][5]
6. tickled pink, tickled to death: very pleased.^[18]
7. (obsolete, c. 1330–1642) To be thrilled with pleasure.^[5][13]

Noun

1. An act of tickling, or a tickling sensation.^[3][13][5]
2. (Canada) In Newfoundland and Labrador, a narrow, difficult strait.^[5][7]

Adjective

1. (dialect) Unsteady, easily upset; precarious or changeable.^[5][7][16]

Word family

• untickled
• rib-tickling
• tickler
• ticklish
• tickly

Related words

• tick
• kittle

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
14. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
17. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
18. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins