Bicker

Pronunciation

• RP IPA: /ˈbɪkÉ™/Rhymes: -ɪkÉ™(r)

Middle English bikeren ‘to attack’, from Middle Dutch bicken ‘to stab, attack’ (modern bikken ‘to hack’), from Proto-Germanic *bikjaną (compare Old English becca ‘pickax’, German picken ‘to peck, pick at’, Old Norse bikkja ‘to plunge into water’), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeg- ‘to smash, break’.

Full definition of bicker

Verb

1. To quarrel in a tiresome, insulting manner.They bickered about dinner every evening.
• Barrowpetty things about which men cark and bicker
2. To move tremulously, quiver, shimmer (of a water stream, of a flame)
• XIX cent, , by Alfred, Lord TennysonI come from haunts of coot and hern,
  I make a sudden sally,
  And sparkle out among the fern,
  To bicker down a valley.
• ThomsonThey streamlets bickered through the sunny shade.
3. To skirmish; to exchange blows; to fight.
• HollandTwo eagles had a conflict, and bickered together.

Derived terms

• bickerer

Synonyms

• wrangle

Noun

1. A skirmish; an encounter.
2. (Scotland, obsolete) A fight with stones between two parties of boys.
3. A wrangle; also, a noise, as in angry contention.

See beaker.

Noun

1. A small wooden vessel made of staves and hoops, like a tub.