fettle

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English

Etymology

From Late Middle English fetlen (“(verb) to bestow; to fix, prepare, put in place; to prepare (oneself) for battle, gird up; to shape; to be about to, or to ready (oneself) to stay; (adjective) shaped (well or poorly)”) , and then possibly:

Compare Old English ġefetelsod (“provided with a belt; trimmed, polished, ornamented”).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈfɛtl̩/
  • Audio (Southern England)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɛtəl
  • Hyphenation: fet‧tle

Noun

fettle (plural fettles)

  1. A state of physical condition; kilter or trim.
    • 1979 August, P. R. G. Kennard, “Polish Steam Panorama”, in Railway World, page 421:
      These strong 2-8-2s […] appeared in good fettle, especially those shedded at Lublin and several arrivals and departures were photographed in the fine evening light.
  2. One's mental state; spirits.
  3. Sand used to line a furnace.
  4. (ceramics) A seam line left by the meeting of mould pieces.
  5. (UK, dialectal) The act of fettling.
  6. (Cumbria, Geordie) A person's mood or state, often assuming the worst.
    What’s yer fettle marra?

Usage notes

Outside of dialects, this noun is a fossil, found only in the phrase in fine fettle; but the verb and the corresponding gerund remain in common use in British English (for example, "this will need a bit of fettling to get sorted").

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

fettle (third-person singular simple present fettles, present participle fettling, simple past and past participle fettled)

  2. (especially Northern England) To sort out, to fix, to mend, to repair.
    Coordinate term: fiddle
  3. (intransitive) To make preparations; to put things in order; to do trifling business.
    • c. 1600, John Ayliffe, Satires:
      Nor list he now go whistling to the car,
      But sells his team , and fettleth to the war
  4. (transitive) To line the hearth of a furnace with sand prior to pouring molten metal.
  5. (reflexive, Geordie) To be upset or in a bad mood.
    Divint fettle yersel ower that!
  6. In ceramics, to remove (as by sanding) the seam lines left by the meeting of two molds.
  7. (transitive, archaic) To prepare.
    • 1595, William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet:
      But fettle your fine joints 'gainst Thursday next...

Derived terms

Translations

See also

References

  1. ^ “fetlen, v.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  2. ^ “fettle, v.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, March 2023; “fettle, v.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Further reading

  • Northumberland Words, English Dialect Society, R. Oliver Heslop, 1893–4
  • “fettle”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
  • Newcastle 1970s, Scott Dobson and Dick Irwin,
  • Todd's Geordie Words and Phrases, George Todd, Newcastle, 1977
  • Frank Graham (1987) The New Geordie Dictionary, →ISBN
  • A List of words and phrases in everyday use by the natives of Hetton-le-Hole in the County of Durham, F.M.T.Palgrave, English Dialect Society vol.74, 1896,
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