piggle

Uncertain. Attested since the nineteenth century. Compare niggle, fiddle.

piggle (plural piggles)

1. (rare) A long-handled fork for mixing or digging.
   • 1859, Murray's Handbook for Devon and Cornwall, page 244:

     A heap of it is then placed upon an inclined platform, under a small fall of water, and repeatedly stirred with a piggle and shovel […]

piggle (third-person singular simple present piggles, present participle piggling, simple past and past participle piggled)

1. (transitive) To dig or uproot; to scrape.
   • 1841, Charles Hooton, Colin Clink, page 140:

     I took my revenge on th' round-house, for I piggled all th' plaster off o' the walls that I could […]

2. (intransitive) To toy or fiddle.
   • 1876, Alfred Dawson, English Landscape Art, in its Position and Prospects, page 16:

     Then all nature was presently converted into an object for microscopic study, so that everything, whether near or far, must be piggled at and made clear to the utmost limit of human power.

   • 1922, D.H. Lawrence, The Fox, page 48:

     Banford, at the other end of the table, said not a word, but piggled with the sardine on her plate.

3. To cause to worry, to make uncomfortable; niggle.
   • 1899, David Belasco, Naughty Anthony:

     BUDD. Get up yourself, and shut up, too! You have piggled me enough, you old smooty-snoot!

4. To worry about minor points.
   • 1836, Joanna Baillee, The Alienated Manor: A Comedy:

     But of what value is all that piggling, niggling, — you call the little thing piggling, niggling?

• higgledy-piggledy