tchotchke

English

Alternative forms

• tsatske, chotchke, chachka, tshatshke, chatchka, chatchke

Etymology

First attested in American English in 1964, from Yiddish טשאַטשקע ‎(tshatshke, “trinket”), from obsolete Polish czaczko; compare Russian цацка ‎(cácka).

Pronunciation

• Audio (US)

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Noun

tchotchke ‎(plural tchotchkes)

1. A small, decorative item or souvenir, usually of no particular value.
   • 1998 Apr, Mark Rakatansky, A/Partments, in Assemblage 35, page 58, [1]

     I am a child of modernism – [...] As such I have inherited a distrust of the tchotchke, which I have still – [...]

   • 1999 Aug 8, Jesse McKinley, The Avant-Garde: Follow That Backpack, in The New York Times, page 5.16

     With limited cash and a thirst for uncommon sights, backpackers have pushed into challenging territory well before the big-money resorts or tchotchke merchants.

   • 2006, Jack Sullivan, Hitchcock's Music, Yale University Press, page 244

     Once again Hitchcock overturned the convention that music must remain subliminally in the background of a film: [...] in its quiet moments, it roams grimly wherever it pleases, investing the most banal images—a toy, [...] a tchotchke of folding hands—with dread.

2. (obsolete) A bimbo.

Synonyms

• (small ornament): See also: Wikisaurus:trinket

See also

• schwag