Jabberwocky

[ jab-er-wok-ee ]
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noun,plural Jab·ber·wock·ies.
  1. a playful imitation of language consisting of invented, meaningless words; nonsense; gibberish.

  2. an example of writing or speech consisting of or containing meaningless words.

adjective
  1. consisting of or comparable to Jabberwocky; meaningless; senseless.

Origin of Jabberwocky

1
Coined by Lewis Carroll in Jabberwocky, poem in Through the Looking Glass (1871); explained by Carroll to mean “the result of much excited and voluble discussion”; from jabber + Old English wocer, wocor “offspring, fruit”
  • Also Jab·ber·wock [jab-er-wok]. /ˈdʒæb ərˌwɒk/.

Words Nearby Jabberwocky

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use Jabberwocky in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for jabberwocky

jabberwocky

/ (ˈdʒæbəˌwɒkɪ) /


nounplural -wockies
  1. nonsense verse

Origin of jabberwocky

1
C19: coined by Lewis Carroll as the title of a poem in Through the Looking Glass (1871)

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012