pother
Americannoun
-
commotion; uproar.
-
a heated discussion, debate, or argument; fuss; to-do.
-
a choking or suffocating cloud, as of smoke or dust.
verb (used with or without object)
-
pothers,
present (3rd person singular)
-
pothered,
past participle, past
-
pothering
present participle
noun
-
a commotion, fuss, or disturbance
-
a choking cloud of smoke, dust, etc
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
pothersimple
-
potherssimple
-
have potheredperfect
-
has potheredperfect
-
am potheringprogressive
-
are potheringprogressive
-
is potheringprogressive
-
have been potheringperfect progressive
-
has been potheringperfect progressive
Past
-
potheredsimple
-
had potheredperfect
-
was potheringprogressive
-
were potheringprogressive
-
had been potheringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of pother
First recorded in 1585–95; origin uncertain
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Intent on his pursuits, impervious to the demonic, he will not notice the gods' dreadful pother being made above his head.
From Time Magazine Archive
Thus it was amid no end of Imperial pother last week that Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain ended his holiday in Scotland, resumed the helm at No. 10 Downing Street.
From Time Magazine Archive
The pother at Yale had begun the week before, when a fine fall of late winter snow had coincided with a fettlesome rise of early spring sap.
From Time Magazine Archive
Hardly less of a pother has Caltech's famed Robert Andrews Millikan made by his controversies with colleagues who did not see his cosmic ray theories as he did.
From Time Magazine Archive
Rising with a gesture of impatience to retire from the field, he cried out: 'There, there! what a pother, to be sure!
From My Lords of Strogue, Vol. I (of III) A Chronicle of Ireland, from the Convention to the Union by Lewis Wingfield
Soviet ultimatums about Berlin, and assorted parliamentary pothers in Britain.
From Time Magazine Archive
“As if he would want to be pothered with an old aunt!” cried Rhoda.
From The Maidens' Lodge None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) by Horace Petherick
Unlike their fraternity in the ring of Seville, where they are doomed to die, the animals are only doomed to be pothered; they are "scotched, not killed."
From The Andes and the Amazon Across the Continent of South America by James Orton
“Ho! inteed!” exclaimed Angus, rising in wrath, and cramming his pipe into his vest pocket; “it is herself that will pe pothering you no more spout your dirty land, Samyool Ruvnshaw.”
From The Red Man's Revenge A Tale of The Red River Flood by R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne
That she possessed any sense of humour was in itself one of those human miracles which metaphysicians are always pothering over without arriving anywhere; for her previous environment had been particularly humourless.
From The Ragged Edge by Harold MacGrath
In a few moments I hear cries and yells and shouts, and a pothering and squabbling.
From The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano Tales from the German of Tieck by Ludwig Tieck
While his subtle mind was pothering with schemes of detection, the affair presented itself in another light, and he laughed at his own dulness.
From The Prince of India — Volume 01 by Lewis Wallace
See them prepare a dish of various fish, Showering profuse the pounded Indian grain, An overpowering vapour, gallimaufry A multitude confused of pothering odours!
From Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 2 by Isaac Disraeli
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
