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If things are higgledy-piggledy, they are mixed together in an way — not in a line, not in a neat pile. Clothes on a bed, books on a desk, houses on a hill can all be higgledy-piggledy. It can sit in front of a noun (a higgledy-piggledy pile) or after a verb (piled higgledy-piggledy), like an adverb. The word is informal and playful; it sounds a little old-fashioned and a little comic, the kind of thing a storybook or a might say. Younger speakers still understand it, but they more often say messy, all over the place, or all mixed up. Though actually, it is not a strong word for dirt or for serious disorder; it is more about things sitting every which way.
亂七八糟;雜亂無章;橫七豎八
組成A rhyming double word (the two halves echo each other). First used around 1598. The Oxford English Dictionary suggests a possible link to pig, because pigs huddle in irregular groups, but that connection is not certain. An older form, hoggledy-piggledy, may take its first part from archaic Welsh hogldy, a hovel — also not certain.
原始詞典資料5 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法,原文照列,我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的;有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
higgledy-piggledyadj詞源 1/ˈhɪɡəldiˌpɪɡəldi/
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slangIn utter disorder or confusion; mixed up.
- I can't find your memo since my desk is all higgledy-piggledy.
- A farmer in Hampshire was sorely distressed by the unsettling of his barn. However straightly over-night he laid his sheaves on the threshing-floor for the application of the morning's flail, when morning came, all was topsy-turvy, higgledy-piggledy, though the door remained locked, and there was no sign whatever of irregular entry.
higgledy-piggledyadv詞源 1/ˈhɪɡəldiˌpɪɡəldi/
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slangIn a confused, disordered, or random way.
- There is no kind of arrangement as regards the buildings they are erected "higgledy-piggledy;" backs to fronts, anyhow, with narrow passages between.
higgledy-piggledynoun詞源 1/ˈhɪɡəldiˌpɪɡəldi/
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A disordered jumble; a confusion.
- A Higgledy-Piggledy of Controversies and Opinions on various intereſting Subjects
higgledy-piggledynoun詞源 2/ˈhɪɡəldiˌpɪɡəldi/
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A double-dactyl; a short poem with eight lines in dactylic meter.
- Higgledy-piggledies are more sophisticated than clerihews: they comprise double dactyls and rhymes and aren't always biographical.
- 2
Any of various word games using rhyming compounds or dactylic words or phrases.
- The games are a bit archaically presented, but they include palindromes, acrostics, higgledy-piggledies, anagrams, etc.
資料來源:英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary(CC BY-SA 4.0)。 原文照列,未經改寫。