twinkle

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English twinklen,^[2][3][4][5] inherited from Old English twinclian (“to twinkle, wink”),^{[6][3][7][8][9]} a frequentative of an unrecorded *twincan (“to wink, blink”), with the suffix -le.^{[6][9][8][10]} That verb is seen in Middle English twinken (“to wink, blink”),^[4][11][12] and is related to Middle High German zwinken (“to wink”) and German zwinkern,^{[9][8][5][13]} and to Middle Dutch twinc (“wink of an eye”).^[4] Etymonline, Klein and Partridge consider it probably imitative,^[9][5][11] and Skeat took twink as a nasalised form of Middle English twikken (“to twitch”).^[12] The noun, from 1548, is formed from the verb.^[6][8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

To shine with a rapidly flickering light: before 899, in Alfred's translation of Boethius' De Consolatione Philosophiae,^[8][6] where the speaker saw a little light twinkle.^[7]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the verb was used of people for winking, often in a meaningful, sly or scornful way;^[2][9] Chaucer used it three times.^[14] The sense "to wink, blink" lasted from the 14th to the early 19th century,^[15] and the noun twinkle was first a wink or blink (1548).^[6][8] The time it takes to wink, a moment, is just as old,^[15] first in twinkling (1303, in the phrase the twinkling of an eye);^[8] Cresswell suggests that the phrase survived because it appears in the Bible ("in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump").^[15] The noun took this sense in Marlowe's Jew of Malta (about 1592); the phrases in a twinkle and the twinkle of an eye are now its only use.^[6] From the 17th century the noun also meant a sparkle of light, especially of the fixed stars (1660s in Etymonline and Barnhart, 1689 in the OED).^[9][8][6] The verb was used of rapid movement to and fro by 1616^[6] and of quick movement of the feet by the 1640s;^[9] in 1920 twinkle was also the name of a ballroom dance step.^[6] In Somerset, Devon and Cornwall dialect twinkle was an instant, and in Yorkshire and Devon the verb meant to twitch or tingle.^[16]

Timeline

• before 899 – to shine with a rapidly flickering light.^[8][6]
• before 1300 – to wink or blink.^[6]
• 1303 – twinkling, the time of a wink, in the twinkling of an eye.^[8]
• before 1547 – transitive, to give out flashes of light.^[6]
• 1548 – noun, a wink or blink.^[6][8]
• c. 1592 – noun, the time of a wink, an instant.^[6]
• 1616 – to move rapidly to and fro, to flit.^[6]
• 1689 – noun, a sparkle or glimmer of light.^[6] Barnhart dates it to 1663, and Etymonline to the 1660s.^[8][9]
• 1920 – a ballroom dance step.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To shine with a flickering or intermittent light; to sparkle: Lights twinkled along the harbour.^[17][4][6]
2. Of the eyes, to sparkle, especially with amusement or delight.^[17][10]
3. (rare) To move about quickly; to flit or flutter.^[17][6]
4. (rare) To wink or blink.^[17][6]

Noun

1. A flickering gleam of light; a sparkle or glimmer.^[17][4][6]
2. A bright, often amused look in the eyes.^[17][10]
3. An instant, as in the phrase in a twinkle.^[17][4][6]
4. (rare) A wink or blink of the eyes.^[17][4][6]

Word family

• twinkler
• twinkly

Related words

• twink
• twinkling
• tinkle

Usage notes

A separate, rare verb twinkle, meaning to tinkle, is recorded from before 1400; it is imitative, and compared with tinkle.^[6][10]

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 The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
12. ^ a b Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
14. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
15. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
16. ^ 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. ^ a b c d e f g h Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins