bicker

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈbɪkə/

  • Audio (UK)

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  Rhymes: -ɪkə(r)

Etymology 1

From Middle English bikeren (“to attack”), from Middle Dutch bicken (“to stab, thrust, attack”) +‎ -er (frequentative suffix), from Proto-Germanic *bikjaną (compare Old English becca (“pickax”), Dutch bikken (“to hack”), German picken (“to peck, pick at”), Old Norse bikkja (“to plunge into water”)), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeg- (“to smash, break”). Compare also German Low German bickern (“to nibble, gnaw”).

Verb

bicker (third-person singular simple present bickers, present participle bickering, simple past and past participle bickered)

1. To quarrel in a tiresome, insulting manner.

   They bickered about dinner every evening.

   • a. 1677, Isaac Barrow, Of Industry in our particular Calling, as Scholars (sermon)

     petty things about which men cark and bicker

2. To brawl or move tremulously, quiver, shimmer (of a water stream, light, flame, etc.)
   • 1748, James Thomson, “Canto I”, in The Castle of Indolence: […], London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], OCLC 54163524, stanza III, page 2:

     Mean time unnumber'd glittering Streamlets play'd, / And hurled every-where their Waters ſheen; / That, as they bicker'd through the ſunny Glade, / Though reſtleſs ſtill themſelves, a lulling Murmur made.

   • 1886, The Brook, by Tennyson

     I come from haunts of coot and hern, / I make a sudden sally, / And sparkle out among the fern, / To bicker down a valley.

3. (of rain) To patter.
4. To skirmish; to exchange blows; to fight.
   • 1606, Philemon Holland, The Historie of Twelve Caesars

     Two egles had a conflict, and bickered together.

Synonyms

• wrangle
• See also Thesaurus:squabble

Derived terms

• bickerer

Translations

quarrel in a tiresome manner

• Bulgarian: дърля се (dǎrlja se), карам се (karam se)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 鬥嘴 (zh), 斗嘴 (zh) (dòuzuǐ)

• Danish: skændes, mundhugges
• Dutch: harrewarren (nl), bekvechten (nl), kibbelen (nl)
• Finnish: kiistellä (fi), nahistella (fi), kinastella (fi)
• French: ^{(please verify)} se chamailler (fr)
• German: streiten (de) (reflexive), zanken (de) (reflexive), fetzen (de) (reflexive), miteinander rangeln, in den Haaren liegen (reflexive), in Streit geraten

• Interlingue: querellar
• Italian: bisticciare (it), litigare (it)
• Japanese: 喧嘩する (kenkasuru)
• Maori: komekome, tarahae, korokīkī
• Polish: sprzeczać się (pl) impf, posprzeczać się (pl) pf
• Russian: переругиваться (ru) (pererugivatʹsja), препираться (ru) (prepiratʹsja)
• Swedish: gnabbas, kivas (sv), munhuggas (sv), käbbla (sv)

Noun

bicker (plural bickers)

1. A skirmish; an encounter.
2. (Scotland, obsolete) A fight with stones between two parties of boys.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Jamieson to this entry?)

3. A wrangle; also, a noise, as in angry contention.
4. The process by which selective eating clubs at Princeton University choose new members.
   • 2005, Alison Fraser, Princeton University: Princeton, New Jersey, College Prowler, Inc (→ISBN), page 41:

     Bicker process varies by club, and there are often concerns of the rights of female students during bicker […]

Translations

skirmish

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 衝突 (zh), 冲突 (zh) (chōngtū)

• Dutch: please add this translation if you can

• Finnish: kiista (fi), nahistelu (fi), kina (fi)
• Italian: bisticcio (it) m, lite (it) f
• Russian: стычка (ru) f (styčka)

Etymology 2

From Scots bicker, from Middle English biker. Doublet of beaker.

Noun

bicker (plural bickers)

1. (Scotland) A wooden drinking-cup or other dish.
   • 1824, James Hogg, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, Oxford 2010, p. 6:

     …the liquors were handed around in great fulness, the ale in large wooden bickers, and the brandy in capacious horns of oxen.

Further reading

• bicker in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• bicker in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911.
• Bicker in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)