Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A rag, or a part torn and hanging: commonly applied to thin and flexible fabrics, as cloth, paper, or leather: chiefly used in the plural.
  • noun A ragged fellow; a tatterdemalion.
  • To rend or tear into rags or shreds; wear to tatters.
  • To fall into rags or shreds; become ragged.
  • To chatter; gabble; jabber.
  • To stir actively and laboriously.
  • noun One who tats, or makes tatting.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who makes tatting.
  • noun A rag, or a part torn and hanging; -- chiefly used in the plural.
  • transitive verb To rend or tear into rags; -- used chiefly in the past participle as an adjective.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A shred of torn cloth; an individual item of torn and ragged clothing.
  • noun A person engaged in tatting.
  • verb To destroy an article of clothing by shredding.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a small piece of cloth or paper

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

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Examples

  • Yeats had his own solution: "An aged man is but a paltry thing, /A tattered coat upon a stick, unless /Soul clap hands and sing, and louder sing / For every tatter in its mortal dress."

    Peter Davis: Milestone or Millstone? Peter Davis 2012

  • Yeats had his own solution: "An aged man is but a paltry thing, /A tattered coat upon a stick, unless /Soul clap hands and sing, and louder sing / For every tatter in its mortal dress."

    Peter Davis: Milestone or Millstone? Peter Davis 2012

  • All things tatter and fade like a garment; You cast them off like a change of clothes.

    In the Valley of the Shadow James L. Kugel 2011

  • Yeats had his own solution: "An aged man is but a paltry thing, /A tattered coat upon a stick, unless /Soul clap hands and sing, and louder sing / For every tatter in its mortal dress."

    Peter Davis: Milestone or Millstone? Peter Davis 2012

  • All things tatter and fade like a garment; You cast them off like a change of clothes.

    In the Valley of the Shadow James L. Kugel 2011

  • Her cane, made from a tatter umbrella, rights her slender body as best it can, but still she stumbles on the uneven path.

    Eudora Welty (copy) ____Maggie 2009

  • All things tatter and fade like a garment; You cast them off like a change of clothes.

    In the Valley of the Shadow James L. Kugel 2011

  • All things tatter and fade like a garment; You cast them off like a change of clothes.

    In the Valley of the Shadow James L. Kugel 2011

  • Her cane, made from a tatter umbrella, rights her slender body as best it can, but still she stumbles on the uneven path.

    Archive 2009-01-01 ____Maggie 2009

  • Yeats had his own solution: "An aged man is but a paltry thing, /A tattered coat upon a stick, unless /Soul clap hands and sing, and louder sing / For every tatter in its mortal dress."

    Peter Davis: Milestone or Millstone? Peter Davis 2012

Comments

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  • Cross; peevish. Old mistress is tedious tatter. --old provincial term from Kent England.

    May 17, 2011