marbles
Britishnoun
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(functioning as singular) a game in which marbles are rolled at one another, similar to bowls
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informal (functioning as plural) wits
to lose one's marbles
Explanation
Marbles is the name of a game that you play with the round glass balls also called marbles. A World Marbles Championship has been held each year in Britain since 1932. Don't miss it this year. Marbles is a game that involves rolling marbles on a sidewalk, inside a marked circle. Players shoot or flick their marbles with their thumbs, aiming "shooters," larger marbles, at the smaller ones, and trying to keep their own marbles inside the circle while hitting other players' marbles out of it. Doing this gives the player a point, and they also get to keep the marble. To "lose your marbles" comes from American slang and means "go crazy."
Vocabulary lists containing marbles
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.
But Lee marbles other theories and indictments into his meat concerning the privilege of extreme emotion and behavioral honesty.
From Salon • Apr. 23, 2026
If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, and expecting different results, England have collectively lost their marbles and their wickets.
From BBC • Dec. 7, 2025
The simulations track how gas in the plumes behaves on very small scales, where individual particles move, collide, and transfer energy in a way similar to marbles bouncing into one another.
From Science Daily • Nov. 18, 2025
The book was clearly fiction — featuring characters such as an absurdly monastic Bolivian radio-novela writer who loses his marbles and begins to confuse his characters and his plots.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 13, 2025
We were playing marbles in the cemetery—there were always good patches of dirt to be found there.
From Full of Beans by Jennifer L. Holm
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.
