thimblerig
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English[edit]
Alternative forms[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Pronunciation[edit]
- (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA(key): /ˈθɪmbəlɹɪɡ/
Audio (Southern England) (file) - Hyphenation: thim‧ble‧rig
Noun[edit]
thimblerig (countable and uncountable, plural thimblerigs)
- A game of skill which requires the bettor to guess under which of three small cups (or thimbles) a pea-sized object has been placed after the party operating the game rapidly rearranges them, providing opportunity for sleight-of-hand trickery; a shell game.
- Synonym: shell game
- 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 45, in The History of Pendennis. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:
- He’ll muddle away the Begum’s fortune at thimble-rig, be caught picking pockets, and finish on board the hulks.
- 1908, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “Modern Rural Sports”, in The Gentle Grafter, New York, N.Y.: The McClure Company, →OCLC:
- ‘Great Barnums?’ says I. ‘You're a ringer for a circus thimblerig man.’
- One operating such a game.
- Synonym: thimblerigger
Translations[edit]
sleight-of-hand betting game — see also shell game
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person operating such a game — see also thimblerigger
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Verb[edit]
thimblerig (third-person singular simple present thimblerigs, present participle thimblerigging, simple past and past participle thimblerigged)
- (intransitive) To cheat in the thimblerig game.
- 1916, Irvin S. Cobb, “Enter the villain”, in Local Color[1]:
- Old Pratt is a different kind of crook—a psalm-singing, pussyfooted old buccaneer, teaching a Bible class on Sundays and thimblerigging in Wall Street on week days.
- (transitive, intransitive, figuratively) To cheat (someone) by trickery.
- 1905, David Graham Phillips, The Plum Tree[2]:
- The favor is to you. I do not permit any man to thimblerig his debts to me into my debts to him.
See also[edit]
Further reading[edit]
- thimblerig on Wikipedia.Wikipedia