thimblerig

English

WOTD – 26 July 2016

Etymology

L’Escamoteur (The Conjurer, c. 1502, detail) by Hieronymus Bosch and/or his workshop, collection of the Musée Municipal in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Île-de-France, France. A man of rank is shown peering spellbound at a game of cups and balls, similar to thimblerig, operated by a conjurer. (The full painting can be viewed here.)

From thimble +‎ rig.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈθɪmbəlɹɪɡ/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: thim‧ble‧rig

Noun

thimblerig (countable and uncountable, plural thimblerigs)

1. A game of skill which requires the bettor to guess under which of three small cups (or thimbles) a pea-sized object has been placed after the party operating the game rapidly rearranges them, providing opportunity for sleight-of-hand trickery; a shell game.

   Synonym: shell game

   • 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 45, in The History of Pendennis. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:

     He’ll muddle away the Begum’s fortune at thimble-rig, be caught picking pockets, and finish on board the hulks.

2. One operating such a game.

   Synonym: thimblerigger

Translations

sleight-of-hand betting game

• Bulgarian: тука има - тука няма (tuka ima - tuka njama)
• Hungarian: itt a piros
• Russian: напёрстки (napjórstki)
• Spanish: trile (es) m
• Tagalog: tatlong-didal

person operating such a game

• Russian: напёрсточник (ru) (napjórstočnik)
• Spanish: trilero m

Verb

thimblerig (third-person singular simple present thimblerigs, present participle thimblerigging, simple past and past participle thimblerigged)

1. (intransitive) To cheat in the thimblerig game.
2. (transitive, intransitive, figuratively) To cheat (someone) by trickery.

See also

• three-card monte

Further reading

• thimblerig on Wikipedia.Wikipedia