Library / English Dictionary

JINGLE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A comic verse of irregular measure

Example:

he had heard some silly doggerel that kept running through his mind

Synonyms:

doggerel; doggerel verse; jingle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("jingle" is a kind of...):

rhyme; verse (a piece of poetry)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A metallic sound

Example:

the jangle of spurs

Synonyms:

jangle; jingle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural events

Hypernyms ("jingle" is a kind of...):

sound (the sudden occurrence of an audible event)

Derivation:

jingle (make a sound typical of metallic objects)

jingly (having a series of high-pitched ringing sounds like many small bells)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Make a sound typical of metallic objects

Example:

The keys were jingling in his pocket

Synonyms:

jangle; jingle; jingle-jangle

Classified under:

Verbs of seeing, hearing, feeling

Hypernyms (to "jingle" is one way to...):

make noise; noise; resound (emit a noise)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Sentence example:

The coins jingle

Derivation:

jingle (a metallic sound)

Credits

 Context examples: 

I know it was near the bar, on account of the smell of spirits and jingling of glasses.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

At length, when it was quite dark, Clever Elsie awoke and when she got up there was a jingling all round about her, and the bells rang at each step which she took.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Reluctantly Martin yielded to the claims of the grocer, paying his bill with him in full, and receiving in change a pocketful of jingling coin.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

His comrade was a large, red-headed man upon a great black horse, with a huge canvas bag slung from his saddle-bow, which jingled and clinked with every movement of his steed.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He was keenly on the alert, however, and it seemed to me that the stroke of the clock and the thong of his whip fell together—not in a blow, but in a sharp snap over the leader, which sent us flying with a jingle and a rattle upon our fifty miles’ journey.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Promptly afterwards, fresh sounds of astonishment arose; the window of the captain's room was thrown open with a slam and a jingle of broken glass, and a man leaned out into the moonlight, head and shoulders, and addressed the blind beggar on the road below him.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Even this, showing me the basket-trifle, full of keys, still hanging at her side, seems to jingle a kind of old tune!

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Immediately on recovering his clothes he had gone to see Ruth, and on the way he could not refrain from jingling the little handful of silver in his pocket.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

There, with that jingle in his head, a bracer on his left hand, a shooting glove on his right, and a farthing's-worth of wax in his girdle, what more doth a bowman need?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It chanced one summer morning, when Boy Jim and I were standing by the smithy door, that there came a private coach from Brighton, with its four fresh horses, and its brass-work shining, flying along with such a merry rattle and jingling, that the Champion came running out with a hall-fullered shoe in his tongs to have a look at it.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)