dodder
1 Americanverb (used without object)
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dodders,
present (3rd person singular)
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doddered,
past participle, past
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doddering
present participle
noun
verb
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to move unsteadily; totter
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to shake or tremble, as from age
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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doddersimple
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dodderssimple
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have dodderedperfect
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has dodderedperfect
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am dodderingprogressive
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are dodderingprogressive
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is dodderingprogressive
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have been dodderingperfect progressive
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has been dodderingperfect progressive
Past
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dodderedsimple
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had dodderedperfect
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was dodderingprogressive
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were dodderingprogressive
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had been dodderingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of dodder1
First recorded in 1610–20; origin uncertain; perhaps a variant of dadder “to shake, tremble,” of expressive origin; cf. dither, totter, teeter, etc.
Origin of dodder2
1225–75; Middle English doder; cognate with Dutch, Danish dodder, Middle Low German dod ( d ) er, Middle High German toter, German Dotter
Explanation
When you dodder, you walk in a shaky or trembling way. You're most likely to see older people dodder, moving slowing and unsteadily. People usually dodder because of illness, disability, or the fragility of very old age. Your great Aunt Martha may dodder over to you, but then give you a powerful bear hug when she gets there. The verb dodder dates from the 1600's, and it's thought to have probably come from the Middle English daderen, "to quake or tremble."
Vocabulary lists containing dodder
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:
The supporting cast gets to dodder about as magnified versions of Ibsen’s melodramatic figures, with Jamie Smithson a particular hoot as Hedda’s Olympian-grade nerd of a husband.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 25, 2019
And there are the plants that have strayed from their photosynthetic ways and turned to the dark side — the parasites, such as Cuscuta, or dodder.
From Nature ● Feb. 28, 2017
Note that the vines of the dodder, which has white flowers, are beige.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2015
Lithgow's Tobias is content to dodder on the margins, but when he's forced by Agnes to assume responsibility as head of the house, he summons the necessary strength.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 20, 2014
Timothy panted, “D’eye! We can relax a bit till dodder side 0 d’tempis’ hit us.”
From "The Cay" by Theodore Taylor
Scott Ward Abernethy is obviously having a blast channeling Audrey’s sadistic-dentist boyfriend, as well as assorted cameo figures, and Robert John Biedermann dodders aptly as the shop’s cantankerous owner, Mr. Mushnik.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 24, 2019
But now and then, when she fleetingly dodders, or loses her train of thought, she becomes a poignant figure.
From Washington Post ● May 10, 2017
As he dodders round his ex-wife's kitchen in west London, I wonder what that young self would have made of the man he is today.
From The Guardian ● May 21, 2010
Like the majority of dodders, this species is an annual, so that, as soon as the cycle of vegetation is accomplished, the plant dies after flowering and fruiting.
From Scientific American Supplement, No. 430, March 29, 1884 by Various
The dodders and mistletoes rob juices from the stem and branches of their unfortunate hosts; more numerous still are the unbidden guests that fasten themselves upon the roots of their prey.
From Little Masterpieces of Science: The Naturalist as Interpreter and Seer by George Iles
Mr. Mueller only doddered around painfully and failed to satisfy Mr. Cohen.
From Washington Times ● Jul. 24, 2019
Her old coot of a husband doddered over to see what the trouble was.
From The New Yorker ● Jun. 25, 2018
Dominic Cavendish of the Telegraph wrote that the Pythons "came, they doddered, but they conquered."
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2014
For nine days, the 61st Cannes Film festival had doddered along into a premature senility.
From Time Magazine Archive
Thither she steered, defying wind and snow; guided by here a thorn-tree, there an old, doddered oak, which had not quite lest their identity under the whelming mask of snow.
From Half a Life-Time Ago by Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
The interview is utterly anodyne, a doddering exchange of pleasantries and carefully selected humanizing anecdotes.
From Slate ● Dec. 18, 2025
Whereas he once presented himself as a vain peacock, Clay here comes off as spacey and a bit doddering, swaddled in scarves and wide sunglasses and outfits Susie Essman might wear on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”
From New York Times ● Jan. 19, 2024
Some aides, according to Axios, wish Mr. Biden would more often show this side of him to counter concerns that the 80-year-old is too doddering for office amid frequent oral gaffes.
From Washington Times ● Jul. 11, 2023
He portrays himself as a doddering old man who is both daunted by his own disorganization and too dimwitted to understand this whole "subpoena" business.
From Salon ● Jun. 21, 2023
The Marquess of Tilbury’s doddering hand rose to his pocket handkerchief.
From "Secrets at Sea" by Richard Peck
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.
