dandle, v.
(ˈdænd(ə)l)
Also 6 dandil(l, -yll.
[Not known before 16th c. To be compared with It. dandola, var. of dondola, ‘a childes baby [= doll]; also a dandling’; dandolare, var. of dondolare, ‘to dandle the baby’ (Florio), to swing, toss, shake to and fro; dally, loiter, idle, play, sport, toy. But actual evidence of the derivation of the Eng. word from the Italian has not been found. Another suggestion is that the word may be cognate with Ger. tändeln intr. ‘to dawdle, toy, trifle, dally, play, dandle’, dim of MHG. tänden to make sport (with), play; but no word of this family is known in Old or Mid.Eng., and the sense is not so close to the English as in the Italian word.]
1. trans. To move (a child, etc.) lightly up and down in the arms or on the knee. Also fig.
| 1530 Palsgr. 506/2, I dandyll, as a mother or nourryce doth a childe upon their lappe. 1614 Bp. Hall Recoll. Treat. 804 Your Church, in whose lappe the vilest miscreants are dandled. c 1672 Wood Life (Oxf. Hist. Soc.) I. 79 [He] would often take her out of the cradle, dandle her in his armes. 1762 Goldsm. Nash 93 Dandling two of Mr. Wood's children on her knees. 1847 J. Wilson Chr. North (1857) I. 146 He sits dandling his child on his knee. 1882 F. P. Verney in Contemp. Rev. XLII. 961 The nurse took up a child and dandled it kindly. |
b. transf. To move (anything) up and down playfully in the hand.
| a 1678 Marvell Poems, Checker Inn, Thou'lt ken him out by a white wand He dandles always in his hand. 1865 Tylor Early Hist. Man. ii. 20 In the sign..for ‘child’, the right elbow is dandled upon the left hand. |
2. fig. To make much of, pet, fondle, pamper.
| 1575 Gascoigne Pr. Pleas. Kenilw. Wks. (1587) 12, I would confesse that fortune then, fully freendly dyd me dandle. 1592 W. Wyrley Armorie 143 She dandles him, and then on him she frowns. 1605 Z. Jones Loyer's Specters 16 Which did entertain and dandle him with all manner of delights. 1742 Young Nt. Th. i. 315 By blindness thou art blest; By dotage dandled to perpetual smiles. 1881 Goldwin Smith Lectures & Ess. 42 No man or nation ever was dandled into greatness. |
† 3. To trifle, play, or toy with. Obs.
| 1569 E. Fenton Secr. Nature 66 a, Noble men, whome she courted and dandled with such dissimuled sleightes in loue. 1596 Spenser State Irel. Wks. (Globe) 648/1 They doe soe dandle theyr doinges, and dallye in the service to them committed, as yf they would not have the Enemye subdued. 1611 Speed Hist. Gt. Brit. ix. xx. (1632) 970 King Henries Ambassadors..hauing been dandled by the French during these illusiue practises. 1646 J. Hall Horæ Vac. 83 Some studies would be hug'd as imployments, others onely dandled as sports. |
4. intr. To play or toy (with). rare.
| 1829 Westm. Rev. XI. 207 That sort of dandling with Irish history. 1865 Carlyle Fredk. Gt. VI. xvi. ix. 256 While dandling with the flute. |
† 5. = dangle. Obs. (? erroneous.)
| 1614 R. Tailor Hog hath lost Pearl iv. in Hazl. Dodsley XI. 480 A holy spring, about encompassed By dandling sycamores and violets. 1656 W. D. tr. Comenius' Gate Lat. Unl. §147 The wild Swan..in his crop, (dandling just below his beak) insatiable. 1687 A. Lovell tr. Bergerac's Com. Hist. i. 33 Having more shaggy Rags dandling about me than the errantest Tatterdemallion. |
† 6. = dander 1. Sc. Obs.
| a 1600 J. Burel in Watson Collect. (1706) II. 39 (Jam.) Euin as the blind man gangs be ges, In houering far behynd, So dois thou dandill in distres. |