totter

tot·ter

1. to rock or shake as if about to fall; be unsteady
2. to be on the point of failure or collapse
to proceed with feeble, unsure steps

Origin of totter

Middle English toteren, probably from Scand, as in Norwegian dialect, dialectal totra, to quiver, shake

an unsteady walk or movement

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MLA Style

"totter." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 11 June 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/TOTTER>.

APA Style

totter. (n.d.). Retrieved June 11th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/TOTTER

totter

intransitive verb

tot·tered, tot·ter·ing, tot·ters

a. To sway as if about to fall.
b. To appear about to collapse: an empire that had begun to totter.
To walk unsteadily or feebly; stagger. See Synonyms at blunder.

noun

The act or condition of tottering.

Origin of totter

Middle English toteren perhaps of Scandinavian origin

Related Forms:

tot′ter·er
noun

tot′ter·y
adjective

THE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Link/Cite

Link to this page

Cite this page

MLA Style

"totter." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 11 June 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/TOTTER>.

APA Style

totter. (n.d.). Retrieved June 11th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/TOTTER

Noun

(plural totters)

an unsteady movement or gait
(archaic) A rag and bone man.

Verb

(third-person singular simple present totters, present participle tottering, simple past and past participle tottered)

To walk,move or stand unsteadily or falteringly; threatening to fall.
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.
(archaic, intransitive) To collect junk or scrap.

Origin

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 *taltrÅnÄ…, *taltÅnÄ… (“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.