raddle

Note: The Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, treats raddle as "apparently a variant of ruddle,", with the difference in vowel lacking explanation. The Middle English Dictionary regards radel as a derivative of rad, taken as a variant of red, rede red entry 1. There is also a variant reddle, presumably regional in Britain; note reddleman "peddler or merchant who sells red ocher for marking sheep," the profession of Diggory Venn, a character in Thomas Hardy's The Return of the Native.

Note: The noun is apparently not attested before 1577 and is thus later than the verb, used as a gerund radelyng in 1470. The Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, suggests that the noun might be the same as the very marginally attested word radyll "side rail of a cart" (presumably borrowed from Anglo-French ridele, redele, with unexplained vowel change).