tatty
1- cheap or tawdry; vulgar: a tatty production of a Shakespearean play.
- shabby or ill-kempt; ragged; untidy: an old house with dirty windows and tatty curtains.
Origin of tatty
1tatty
2or tat·tie
- (in India) a screen, usually made of coarse, fragrant fibers, placed over a window or door and kept moistened with water in order to cool and deodorize the room.
Origin of tatty
2Related Words for tatty
bedraggled, broken-down, crummy, decayed, decaying, decrepit, deteriorated, dilapidated, dingy, disreputable, faded, mangy, moth-eaten, pitiful, poverty-stricken, ragged, ramshackle, ratty, rickety, run-downExamples from the Web for tatty
Contemporary Examples of tatty
Amidst the detritus of old amplifiers, beaten up electric guitars and drum kits was a tatty white plastic bag.
Historical Examples of tatty
Then Tatty sat down and wept, and a three-legged stool said: "Tatty, why do you weep?"
Then Tatty sat down and wept; then a three-legged stool said: "Tatty, why do you weep?"
Children's LiteratureCharles Madison Curry
Titty and Tatty are among the many rhyming compounds of which the meaning is no longer clear.
Comparative Studies in Nursery RhymesLina Eckenstein
"Titty Mouse and Tatty Mouse" also ends in a universal calamity which seems to arise from a cause of no great importance.
English Fairy TalesAnonymous
Titty Mouse went a-gleaning, and Tatty Mouse went a-gleaning.
English Fairy TalesFlora Annie Steel
tatty
- mainly British worn out, shabby, tawdry, or unkempt
Word Origin for tatty
Word Origin and History for tatty
1510s, "tangled or matted" (of hair), Scottish, probably related to Old English tættec "a rag" (see tatter). Sense of "tattered, ragged, shabby" first recorded 1933.