Double Dutch

noun (sometimes lowercase)

a form of the game of jump rope in which two persons, holding the respective ends of two long jump ropes, swing them in a synchronized fashion, usually directed inward so the ropes are going in opposite directions, for one or two others to jump over.

double Dutch

noun Slang.

unintelligible or garbled speech or language: She could have been talking double Dutch for all we understood of it.

Origin of double Dutch

First recorded in 1875–80

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for double dutch

babble, baloney, gibberish, gobbledygook, hogwash, malarkey, nonsense, rubbish, hooey, Choctaw, Greek, hokum

Examples from the Web for double dutch

Historical Examples of double dutch

The paper was covered with lines, circles, and writing that appeared to us like "double-Dutch."
500 of the Best Cockney War Stories
Various

British Dictionary definitions for double dutch

double Dutch

noun

British informal incomprehensible talk; gibberish

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

Word Origin and History for double dutch

Double Dutch

"gibberish," 1864 (High Dutch for "incomprehensible language" is recorded from 1789); from double (adj.) + Dutch.

Idioms and Phrases with double dutch

double Dutch

Language that cannot be understood, gibberish, as in They might have been speaking double Dutch, for all I understood. This usage dates from the 1870s (an earlier version, however, had it as high Dutch) and is heard less often today than the synonym double talk.

A game of jump rope in which players jump over two ropes swung in a crisscross fashion.