skedaddle
Americanverb (used without object)
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skedaddles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
skedaddled,
past participle, past
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skedaddling
present participle
noun
verb
noun
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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skedaddlesimple
-
skedaddlessimple
-
have skedaddledperfect
-
has skedaddledperfect
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am skedaddlingprogressive
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are skedaddlingprogressive
-
is skedaddlingprogressive
-
have been skedaddlingperfect progressive
-
has been skedaddlingperfect progressive
Past
-
skedaddledsimple
-
had skedaddledperfect
-
was skedaddlingprogressive
-
were skedaddlingprogressive
-
had been skedaddlingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of skedaddle
1860–65, compare dial. ( Scots, N England) skedaddle to spill, scatter, skiddle to move away quickly
Explanation
When you skedaddle, you leave very suddenly. A kid who breaks a window with her baseball might decide to skedaddle before her neighbor comes home from work. You might decide to skedaddle from your aunt's party before she starts showing the slides from her vacation ten years ago, or skedaddle from the town swimming pool when it starts to rain. In either case, you're getting out of there, and fast. Skedaddle is American Civil War military slang, dating from about 1861 — experts aren't sure what its roots are.
Vocabulary lists containing skedaddle
Ben Zimmer's 30 Great American Words
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The Red Umbrella
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"Pitch Perfect," Vocabulary from the movie
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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:
But even the vague threat of personal conflict and humiliation was enough to make him skedaddle down to Mar-a-Lago when it was time to go.
From Salon ● Aug. 16, 2023
There’s no reason pickleballers couldn’t play at the park when children are in school and then skedaddle in the afternoon, she said.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 22, 2022
“The session adjourns and members skedaddle out of there rapidly so it’s hard for journalists to get to them, unlike when they’re on the floor they can immediately get to them.”
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 17, 2022
Friends skedaddle because they're afraid to confront Alice's predicament.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 1, 2016
Dad steered the Blue Goose through the dark, driving slowly so as not to alert anyone in the trailer park that we were, as Dad liked to put it, doing the skedaddle.
From "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walls
At barely an hour, it skedaddles in time to leave you with a sheepish smile.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 19, 2026
And then he skedaddles before the bill comes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 28, 2018
How long till Kelly skedaddles back to college, as Spurrier did?
From New York Times ● Sep. 29, 2015
But Blanc will be invited to take the Liverpool job once Rafael Benítez skedaddles.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 6, 2010
The retreats were called "skedaddles," a term invented at the time by some wag.
From The Strange Story of Harper's Ferry With Legends of the Surrounding Country by Joseph Barry
What if instead of staying in the tomb, she skedaddled with a posy to the Renaissance club scene in Paris and found a new love?
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 11, 2023
Usually the sheep walked away or skedaddled before any physical altercation actually broke out.
From Scientific American ● Oct. 17, 2022
Though they have different fathers, both of whom have long since skedaddled, the half-siblings have similar reactions, within the framework of their evident differences.
From New York Times ● Jun. 22, 2022
One of the few positives is most investors seem to have skedaddled already.
From Reuters ● Feb. 11, 2022
I hugged Dismay first—he was so alive and full of good feelings—and I skedaddled for the house.
From Each Little Bird That Sings by Deborah Wiles
Shame on you for skedaddling anonymously and cowardly away.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 3, 2023
Johnson said she’s taken the middle seat on flights to make up for skedaddling on her fiancé—one of many favors Precheckers told me they perform to mitigate some of the inequities.
From Slate ● Jan. 4, 2020
The team stunk, top to bottom and James had to escape the torment, skedaddling to Miami.
From The Guardian ● Oct. 12, 2018
The electric carts that you will soon see skedaddling around the lawns, meadows and playgrounds are just the latest in a decades-long transformation of trash management.
From New York Times ● Jan. 11, 2017
However illy this skedaddling programme may have suited the men, it is not to be doubted that they would have performed their part well—both the skedaddling and the ringing.
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.
