fiddle

• バイオリン
• vi.ヴァイオリンをふざけて弾く。
• vt.時間を無駄にする；バイオリンを弾く

語源は諸説ある。ラテン語のvitula（管弦楽器）に由来し、語源的にはヴァイオリンと同じで、ローマ神話の喜びと勝利の女神Vitulaに由来する。

fiddle

fiddle: [OE] Like its distant cousin violin, fiddle comes ultimately from the name of a Roman goddess of joy and victory. This was Vītula, who probably originated among the pre-Roman Sabine people of the Italian peninsula. A Latin verb was coined from her name, vītulārī, meaning ‘hold joyful celebrations’, which in post-classical times produced the noun vītula ‘stringed instrument, originally as played at such festivals’.

In the Romance languages this went on to give viola, violin, etc, but prehistoric West and North Germanic borrowed it as *fithulōn, whence German fiedel, Dutch vedel, and English fiddle. In English, the word has remained in use for the instrument which has developed into the modern violin, but since the 16th century it has gradually been replaced as the main term by violin, and it is now only a colloquial or dialectal alternative.

The sense ‘swindle’ originated in the USA in the mid-to-late 19th century.
=> violin

fiddle (n.)

"stringed musical instrument, violin," late 14c., fedele, fydyll, fidel, earlier fithele, from Old English fieele "fiddle," which is related to Old Norse fiela, Middle Dutch vedele, Dutch vedel, Old High German fidula, German Fiedel "a fiddle;" all of uncertain origin.

The usual suggestion, based on resemblance in sound and sense, is that it is from Medieval Latin vitula "stringed instrument" (source of Old French viole, Italian viola), which perhaps is related to Latin vitularia "celebrate joyfully," from Vitula, Roman goddess of joy and victory, who probably, like her name, originated among the Sabines [Klein, Barnhart]. Unless the Medieval Latin word is from the Germanic ones.

FIDDLE, n. An instrument to tickle human ears by friction of a horse's tail on the entrails of a cat. [Ambrose Bierce, "The Cynic's Word Book," 1906]

Fiddle has been relegated to colloquial usage by its more proper cousin, violin, a process encouraged by phraseology such as fiddlesticks (1620s), contemptuous nonsense word fiddle-de-dee (1784), and fiddle-faddle. Century Dictionary reports that fiddle "in popular use carries with it a suggestion of contempt and ridicule." Fit as a fiddle is from 1610s.

fiddle (v.)

late 14c., "play upon a fiddle," from fiddle (n.); the figurative sense of "to act nervously, make idle movements, move the hands or something held in them in an idle, ineffective way" is from 1520s. Related: Fiddled; fiddling.

1. Police investigating a ￡10 million car insurance fiddle arrested 16 people yesterday.

1000万ポンドの自動車保険詐欺事件を捜査していた警察は昨日、16人を逮捕した。

2.Two of them got out to fiddle around with the engine.

このうち2人は車を降りてエンジンをいじった。

3.She hated the thought of playing second fiddle to Rose.

ロスの下にいることを考えると憂鬱になる。

4.Hardy as a young man played the fiddle at local dances.

ハーディは若い頃、地元の舞踏会でバイオリンを演奏していた。

5.He brought out the fiddle ，its varnish cracked and blistered.

彼はバイオリンを取り出し、その表面のワニスに亀裂が生じ、浮き泡ができた。