rataplan
Americannoun
verb (used without object)
noun
Etymology
Origin of rataplan
1840–50; < French; imitative
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:
When the Nazi submariners emerged from the U-boat, they were greeted with a rataplan of small-caliber fire from encircling destroyers.
From Time Magazine Archive
Last week, with no rataplan of drums, The Admiral and The Biscuit met at Pimlico.
From Time Magazine Archive
With the announcement, Peking's vast Square of Heavenly Peace resounded to the beating of gongs, the clash of cymbals, the rataplan of exploding firecrackers.
From Time Magazine Archive
With a rataplan and a paradiddle, U.S. radio last week opened its 1947-48 season.
From Time Magazine Archive
The first furious stampede had settled into a rapid trot, to a sound like the sound of a hundred muffled drums beating a rataplan.
From The Pools of Silence by H. De Vere (Henry De Vere) Stacpoole
During his military career he solemnly rataplanned the drums at Versailles as Woodrow Wilson marched by with Clemenceau.
From Time Magazine Archive
A band rataplanned a Sousa march, and the P.W.s, loaded into trucks, were driven off towards Seoul.
From Time Magazine Archive
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.
