tit

• IPA^(key): /tɪt/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪt

From Middle English tit, titte, tette, from Old English tit, titt, from Proto-West Germanic *titt, from Proto-Germanic *tittaz (“teat; nipple; breast”), of expressive origin.

Perhaps related to an original meaning “to suck”; compare Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-y-. Doublet of teat, which was borrowed from Old French.

• tet (in certain senses only)

tit (plural tits)

1. (slang, vulgar, chiefly in the plural) A person's breast or nipple.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:breast

   • 2012, Caitlin Moran, Moranthology, Ebury Press, published 2012, page 13:

     I have enjoyed taking to my writing bureau and writing about poverty, benefit reform and the coalition government in the manner of a shit Dickens, or Orwell, but with tits.

   • 2006, Benjamin Kunkel, Indecision:

     Sanch tossed his head back, threw open his shirt, cupped his beanbag-shaped male breasts and jiggled them at us. Ford and I were laughing but Kat said, "I think they're the most beautiful tits."

   • 1987, “A Conflict of Interest”, in Antony Jay, Jonathan Lynn, directors, Yes, Prime Minister, season 2, episode 4, spoken by Bernard Woolley (Derek Fowlds), BBC2:

     Sun readers don't care who runs the country as long as she's got big tits.

2. (slang, vulgar) An animal's nipple or udder.
   • 1980 August 16, Andrea Loewenstein, “Random Lust”, in Gay Community News, volume 8, number 5, page 19:

     A large bowl of suckulent ^[sic] raspberries with clotted yellow cream fresh from the goat's tit on the diamond and ruby-studded glass end-table.

3. (British, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, derogatory, slang) An idiot; a fool.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:idiot

   Look at that tit driving on the wrong side of the road!

   • 2000, Guy Ritchie, Snatch (motion picture), spoken by Errol (Andy Beckwith):

     I know a lot of tits, Guv'nor. But I don't know any quite as fucking stupid as these two.

   • 2002, Dick Plamondon, Have You Ever Been Screwed‎, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 234:

     “What did you say to the cops?”
     “I told them everything about the smuggling ring.”
     “Why the fuck did you do that?”
     “They were nice to me.”
     “They’re always nice to people they want to get information from, you dumb tit.”

   • 2012 January 15, Stephen Thompson, "The Reichenbach Fall", episode 2-3 of Sherlock, 00:52:46-00:52:55:

     John Watson (to Sherlock Holmes): It's Lestrade. Says they're all coming over here right now. Queuing up to slap on the handcuffs, every single officer you ever made feel like a tit. Which is a lot of people.

4. (UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, slang, derogatory) A police officer; a "tithead".

• titty, tittie

Perhaps imitative of light tap. Compare earlier tip for tap (“blow for blow”), from tip + tap; compare also dialectal tint for tant.

tit (plural tits)

1. (archaic) A light blow or hit (now usually in the phrase tit for tat).

tit (third-person singular simple present tits, present participle titting, simple past and past participle titted)

1. (transitive or intransitive, obsolete) To strike lightly, tap, pat.
   • 1897 [1607], John Webster, “Northward Hoe”, in The Dramatic Works of John Webster‎, page 203:

     Come tit me, come tat me, come throw a kiss at me—how is that?

2. (transitive, obsolete) To taunt, to reproach.
   • 1623, James Mabbe, The Rogue: Or The Life of Guzman de Alfarache‎, translation of Guzmán de Alfarache by Mateo Alemán:

     they would vpbraid me therewith calling me idle Drone; Titting and flouting at me, that I should offer to sit downe at boord with cleane hand.

A blue tit

Probably of North Germanic/Scandinavian origin; found earliest in titling and titmouse; compare Faroese títlingur, dialectal Norwegian titling (“small stockfish”).

Wikispecies

tit (plural tits)

1. A chickadee; a small passerine bird of the genus Parus or the family Paridae, common in the Northern Hemisphere.
2. Any of various other small passerine birds.
3. (archaic) A small horse; a nag.
   • 1759, [Laurence Sterne], chapter XII, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, 2nd (1st London) edition, volume I, London: […] R[obert] and J[ames] Dodsley […], published 1760, →OCLC, page 66:

     […] he was reſolved, for the time to come, to ride his tit with more ſobriety.

   • 1854, Charles James Collins, The life and adventures of Dick Diminy, page 156:

     Bob trotted gently by the side of the carriage. “Not a bad looking tit,” said St. Leger, as they went along.

   • 1862, Robert Kemp Philp, The Family friend, page 362:

     Gossiping, and smoothing the horse's mane down with his hand, "A nice little tit," said the man.

   • 2019, George Manville Fenn, Cursed by a Fortune:

     I shall keep my eye open, and the first pretty little tit I see that I think will suit you, I shall make the guv'nor buy.

4. (archaic) A young girl, later especially a minx, hussy.
   • 1843, Charles James C. Davidson, Diary of Travels and Adventures in Upper India:

     "What sort of a feringee is this?" said a lively little tit—"eh?"

   • 1887, George Manville Fenn, The Master of the Ceremonies, page 44:

     But I don't mind; she's a pretty little tit, and Dick has taught her to call me uncle.

   • 2013, Vic Gatrell, The First Bohemians: Life and Art in London's Golden Age, page xcix:

     What, I suppose, Mr. Loader, you will be for your old friend the black ey'd girl, from Rosemary Lane. Ha ha! Well, 'tis a merry little tit. A thousand pities she's such a reprobate!

5. A morsel; a bit.
   • 1813, James Lawrence, The Englishman at Verdun; Or the Prisoner of Peace, page 44:

     Now if you can shew so neat a foot, ( shewing her shoe ) —Parlez moi de ça : —I suppose I was not noble enough for this squire; he must have a bit a blood, a tit of quality — but I shall be a countess soon, and a mighty good sort of countess I shall make.

   • 1951, Thomas Henry MacDermot, Tom Redcam, Orange Valley, and Other Poems, page 66:

     Being drunk , he remembers not a tit of life before the drink came well home. It is not that he sees the past mistily; he does not see at all. He lives then only in as much of the present as the word of his master for the time being […]

   • 1988, E. C. Curtsinger, Towers, Crosses, page 236:

     Would we understand woman if we took her whole instead of tit by tit?

   • 1999, Benjamin Capps, A Woman of the People, page 78:

     The one farthest from the river was the largest and tallest; they decreased in size toward the river, until the fourth was little more than a tit of rock jutting up out of the prairie.

• ITT, TTI, itt

Onomatopoeic.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencian) [ˈtit]

tit m (plural tits)

1. a sharp short sound, such as a whistle, especially when used to call poultry
2. (childish) chick

   Synonym: pollet

• tita

• “tit” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
• “tit”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
• “tit” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

tit

1. fence, wall
2. pen (enclosure)

• IPA^(key): /tit/, [ˈtˢid̥]

From Old Norse títt (“often”), the neuter form of the adjective tíðr (“frequent”), from Proto-Germanic *tīdijaz. Derived from the noun *tīdiz (“time”).

tit (comparative tiere, superlative tiest)

1. often
2. frequently

• ofte
• hyppigt
• mange gange

Verbal noun to titte (“peep, peek”).

tit n (singular definite tittet, plural indefinite tit)

1. glimpse

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

tit

1. imperative of titte

From Old Norse þit (earlier Old Norse it), cognate with Icelandic þið.

• IPA^(key): /tiːt/
• Rhymes: -iːt

tit

1. you (plural)

   Synonym: tykur (Suðuroy)

• IPA^(key): /ˈtit/, [ˈt̪it̪]
• Rhymes: -it
• Syllabification^(key): tit

tit

1. Alternative form of ti (“dit (in Morse code)”)

• not inflected

• tuit

From Old Irish do·tuit (“to fall”).

• IPA^(key): /tʲɪtʲ/

tit (present analytic titeann, future analytic titfidh, verbal noun titim, past participle tite)

1. (intransitive) fall
   1. drop down
   2. collapse
   3. descend
   4. decline
   5. come down to lower level
   6. abate
   7. droop, deteriorate
   8. be overthrown, be killed
   9. lose position

• Ó Dónaill, Niall (1977) “tit”, in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, Dublin: An Gúm, →ISBN
• G. Toner, M. Ní Mhaonaigh, S. Arbuthnot, D. Wodtko, M.-L. Theuerkauf, editors (2019), “1 do·tuit”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language
• Entries containing “tit” in English-Irish Dictionary, An Gúm, 1959, by Tomás de Bhaldraithe.
• Entries containing “tit” in New English-Irish Dictionary by Foras na Gaeilge.

tit

1. kingfisher

• IPA^(key): /tit/

tit

1. talk

tit

1. to talk

• Hkaw Luk (2017) A grammatical sketch of Lacid‎, Chiang Mai: Payap University (master thesis)

From Proto-Nahuan *tlai(h)-. Compare Classical Nahuatl tletl (“fire”).

• (standard) IPA^(key): /tiːt/

tīt

1. fire

   Shiktali ne kumit pak ne tit

   Put the pot on the fire

From Proto-Khasian *tit, from Proto-Mon-Khmer *pt₁is. Cognate with Khasi tit, Riang [Sak] tis¹, Khmu [Cuang] tih, Khmer ផ្សិត (phsət).

• IPA^(key): /tit/

tit

1. mushroom

From Ikavian Serbo-Croatian htiti; compare Ijekavian htjeti, Ekavian hteti.

• IPA^(key): /tît/

tit impf

1. to want

• Walter Breu and Giovanni Piccoli (2000), Dizionario croato molisano di Acquaviva Collecroce: Dizionario plurilingue della lingua slava della minoranza di provenienza dalmata di Acquaviva Collecroce in Provincia di Campobasso (Parte grammaticale)., pp. 413–414

From English teeth.

tit

1. tooth

From English teeth.

tit

1. tooth