释义 |
▪ I. ˈtottering, vbl. n. [f. totter v. + -ing1.] The action of the verb totter; oscillation, wavering, shaking as if about to fall.
1387Trevisa Higden (Rolls) II. 387 That game is cleped ocillum in Latyn,..of cilleo cilles þat is forto mene toterynge. c1440Promp. Parv. 498/1 Toterynge, or waverynge, vacillacio. 1577B. Googe Heresbach's Husb. 40 The Wayne or Cart must be lyned with sheets, lest with iogging and tottring of the carryage, the seede fall thorowe. 1672Clarendon Contempl. Ps. Tracts (1727) 280 The prodigious tottering and instability of that [church] they are about to enter. 1890J. H. Stirling Gifford Lect. xii. 262 If you totter already, the tottering against you of ever so many totterers will only floor you. ▪ II. ˈtottering, ppl. a. [f. totter v. + -ing2.] That totters, in various senses of the verb.
1534More Comf. agst. Trib. iv. xxiv. (1847) 298 The three feet of this tottering stool. 1585Abp. Sandys Serm. xiv. 232 Our tottering boate is tossed in the stormie seas. 1610Holland Camden's Brit. (1637) 642 The tottering walles of Caer-philli Castle. 1700T. Brown Amusem. Ser. & Com. ii. 12 The tottering Earth made them Giddy and Stumble. 1801Southey Thalaba ix. xvii, She leans on her staff With a tottering step. 1877Black Green Past. xxxv, A tottering white-headed old man. fig.1554Latimer Disput. Oxford in Foxe A. & M. (1563) 980/1 That thys world hath bene, and yet is, a tottering world. 1649Milton Eikon. v. Wks. 1851 III. 375 A tottring and giddy Act rather then a settling. 1796Burke Regic. Peace i. Wks. VIII. 158 The tottering imbecility of a new government. 1870H. Smart 'Race for Wife iii, Tottering coronets must be propped by wealthy alliances. Hence ˈtotteringly adv.
1660N. Ingelo Bentiv. & Ur. i. (1682) 82 It seem'd to stand totteringly upon a pitiful foundation. 1891L. Keith Lost Illusion II. xii. 41 An old man totteringly and feebly cleaning a little vegetable-bed. |