wamble

See also: Wamble

English

Etymology

From an unknown root (possibly related to Latin vomere (to vomit), Norwegian vamla (to stagger), and Old Norse vāma (vomit)) + -le (frequentative suffix).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈwɑm.bəl/, sometimes /ˈwæm.bəl/

Noun

wamble (plural wambles)

1. (obsolete) Nausea; seething; bubbling.
2. (dialect) An unsteady walk; a staggering or wobbling.
   • 1886 May – 1887 April, Thomas Hardy, “Chapter 11”, in The Woodlanders […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     Fancy her white hands getting redder every day, and her tongue losing its pretty up-country curl in talking, and her bounding walk becoming the regular Hintock shail and wamble!

3. (dialect) A rumble of the stomach.

Derived terms

• wamble-cropped

 

Verb

wamble (third-person singular simple present wambles, present participle wambling, simple past and past participle wambled)

1. (dialect) To feel nauseous, to churn (of stomach).
2. (dialect) To twist and turn; to wriggle; to roll over.
3. (dialect) To wobble, to totter, to waver; to walk with an unsteady gait.
   • 2014 May 6, Cathie Pelletier, Wedding on the Banks: A Novel, Sourcebooks, Inc., →ISBN, page 10:

     Sicily thought of sand flies and wondered how big they were, what color. […] Organs Sicily had not dared contemplate stomped and wambled and scuffed inside of her.

   • 2015 October 29, Carrie Chang, Monkey-Town, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN:

     His leathery shoes exuded some anachronistic wonder, with damp shimmer of copper buckles which changed color with remedy, easily in the light, and he wambled this way and that to the kitchen and wondered to himself about the many lives […]

   • 1886 May – 1887 April, Thomas Hardy, “Chapter 11”, in The Woodlanders […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     She may shail, but she'll never wamble.