Thesaurus: rattle

Related headwords

Definitions

1. v. i. To make a quick succession of sharp, inharmonious noises, as by the collision of hard and not very sonorous bodies shaken together; to clatter.
2. v. i. To drive or ride briskly, so as to make a clattering; as, we rattled along for a couple of miles.
3. v. i. To make a clatter with the voice; to talk rapidly and idly; to clatter; -- with on or away; as, she rattled on for an hour.
4. v. t. To cause to make a rattling or clattering sound; as, to rattle a chain.
5. v. t. To assail, annoy, or stun with a rattling noise.
6. v. t. Hence, to disconcert; to confuse; as, to rattle one's judgment; to rattle a player in a game.
7. v. t. To scold; to rail at.
8. n. A rapid succession of sharp, clattering sounds; as, the rattle of a drum.
9. n. Noisy, rapid talk.
10. n. An instrument with which a rattling sound is made; especially, a child's toy that rattles when shaken.
11. n. A noisy, senseless talker; a jabberer.
12. n. A scolding; a sharp rebuke.
13. n. Any organ of an animal having a structure adapted to produce a rattling sound.
14. n. The noise in the throat produced by the air in passing through mucus which the lungs are unable to expel; -- chiefly observable at the approach of death, when it is called the death rattle. See R/le.