Totter definition
An empire that had begun to totter.
The baby tottered from the table to the chair.
The old man tottered out of the pub into the street.
The car tottered on the edge of the cliff.
Origin of totter
- Middle English toteren perhaps of Scandinavian origin
From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition
- From Middle English totren, toteren, from earlier *tolteren (compare English dialectal tolter (“to struggle, flounder"); Scots tolter (“unstable, wonky")), from Old English tealtrian (“to totter, vacillate"), from Proto-Germanic *taltrōnÄ…, *taltōnÄ… (“to sway, dangle, hesitate"), from Proto-Indo-European *del-, *dul- (“to shake, hesitate"). Cognate with Dutch touteren (“to tremble"), North Frisian talt, tolt (“unstable, shaky"). Related to tilt.
From Wiktionary