Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A tinker; hence, a vagabond; a craven.
  • noun One who or that which tinkles; in slang use, a small bell.

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

  • noun Prov. Eng. A tinker.

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

  • noun UK, dialect A tinker.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • By way of retaliation the youths, when opportunity occurred, would tie the cord of the "tinkler" to the weathercock, and the parish on a stormy night would be startled by the sound of ghostly, fitful ting-tangs.

    The Parish Clerk 1892

  • Now they don't come much more cunning than Mike German, and the old ivory tinkler spotted an opening.

    Archive 2007-10-01 Glyn Davies 2007

  • ‘Hark!’ cried the Dodger at this moment, ‘I heard the tinkler.’

    Oliver Twist 2007

  • Now they don't come much more cunning than Mike German, and the old ivory tinkler spotted an opening.

    The Black Spot Glyn Davies 2007

  • And straight he sat down with the tinkler to joke;

    King James I and the Tinkler 2000

  • 'By the mass!' quoth the tinkler, 'it's nappy brown ale,

    King James I and the Tinkler 2000

  • Ye wid swear he hid deserted frae some tinkler race

    The Barns o' Beneuches 1998

  • You ought to think shame of such conduct, singing your good-for-nothing street-songs like a tinkler.

    Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVI., December, 1880. Various

  • "There's a tinkler wife needin 'a bawbee's-wirth, an' I've socht the shop heich an 'laich for't."

    My Man Sandy J. B. Salmond

  • He lookit like some berfit tinkler wife that had been too, an 'had t'a'in, ower the heid, intil a barrel o' yellow oker; an 'stickin' on his weyst there was ane o 'my winda tickets -- "Just in To-Day."

    My Man Sandy J. B. Salmond

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