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say it: FID-uhl
fiddle is a verb and noun meaning "avoid (one's assigned duties)". It carries 8 recorded senses.
avoid (one's assigned duties)
“The derelict soldier shirked his duties”
commit fraud and steal from one's employer
“We found out that she had been fiddling for years”
manipulate manually or in one's mind or imagination
“She played nervously with her wedding ring”
“Don't fiddle with the screws”
“He played with the idea of running for the Senate”
play around with or alter or falsify, usually secretively or dishonestly
“Someone tampered with the documents on my desk”
“The reporter fiddle with the facts”
bowed stringed instrument that is the highest member of the violin family; this instrument has four strings and a hollow body and an unfretted fingerboard and is played with a bow
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for fiddle come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.