teetotum

American  

[tee-toh-tuhm] / tiˈtoʊ təm /

noun

1. any small top spun with the fingers.

2. a kind of die having four sides, each marked with a different initial letter, spun with the fingers in an old game of chance.

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teetotum British  

/ tiːˈtəʊtəm /

noun

1. a spinning top bearing letters of the alphabet on its four sides

2. such a top used as a die in gambling games

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Etymology

Origin of teetotum

1710–20; earlier T totum, alteration of totum name of toy (< Latin tōtum, neuter of tōtus all) by prefixing its initial letter, which appeared on one side of the toy

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

teetotum

Though no disturbance was reported last week at Brooklyn's Evergreen Cemetery, by rights Anthony Comstock should have been spinning like a teetotum in his grave.

From Time Magazine Archive

“What right have you to try and supplant the servant of the house, who specially went out about it, you little meddlesome teetotum, I’d like to know, hey?”

From Fritz and Eric The Brother Crusoes by John C. (John Conroy) Hutcheson

At length, as he vacantly stared about, he caught a glimpse of Mrs Brown, whom, to save repetition, we may as well call his teetotum wife, hanging about his neighbour’s neck.

From Tales from Blackwood Volume 4 by Various

The instant that everybody is in the boat it is shot out into the water like an arrow from a bow, and brought head around, like a teetotum.

From The Land of Fire A Tale of Adventure by Mayne Reid

A’ the time we lay there it lowped and flang and capered and span like a teetotum, and whiles we could hear it skelloch as it span.

From The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) by Robert Louis Stevenson

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