noddle

English

Etymology 1

Noun

noddle (plural noddles)

1. (UK, informal) The head; the part of the body of an animal or human which contains the brain, mouth and main sense organs.
   • 1596, Tho[mas] Nashe, “Dialogus”, in Haue with You to Saffron-Walden. Or, Gabriell Harveys Hunt is Up. […], London: […] John Danter, →OCLC; republished as J[ohn] P[ayne] C[ollier], editor, Have with You to Saffron-Walden (Miscellaneous Tracts; Temp. Eliz. and Jac. I), [London: s.n., 1870], →OCLC, page 111:

     But being restored to the open aire, the cafe with him was little altred; for no roofe had he to hide his noddle in, or whither he might go to set up his rest, but in the streets under a bulk he should have been constrainted to have kenneld […]

2. (UK, informal) The head as the seat of mental capacity or intellect.
   • 1612–1620, [Miguel de Cervantes], Thomas Shelton, transl., The History of the Valorous and Wittie Knight-errant Don-Quixote of the Mancha. […], London: […] William Stansby, for Ed[ward] Blount and W. Barret, →OCLC, page 123:

     No doubt (said the Barber) but I wonder not so much at the Knights madnesse, as the Squires simplicity, that beleeves so in the Islands, and I think all the Art in the world will not drive that out of his noddle.

   • 1762, [Laurence Sterne], chapter XXXVII, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, volume V, London: […] T. Becket and P. A. Dehondt, […], →OCLC, page 128:

     Novv vvhat can have got into that precious noddle of thine, my dear brother Toby? cried my father, mentally.

3. (obsolete) The back of the head; nape.
   • 1562, Guglielmo Gratarolo, translated by William Fulwood, The Castel of Memorie‎^[1], volume I:

     They muste absteine from ouer much slepe, and not to slepe in the day time, nor [upon] the noddle of the head […]

Quotations

For more quotations using this term, see Citations:noddle.

See also

• noodle

Verb

noddle (third-person singular simple present noddles, present participle noddling, simple past and past participle noddled)

1. (intransitive) To nod repeatedly.

Derived terms

• niddle-noddle

Etymology 2

Verb

noddle (third-person singular simple present noddles, present participle noddling, simple past and past participle noddled)

1. Alternative form of noodle (“improvise musically”).
   • 1977, Musician, Player and Listener, number 9, page 4:

     […] a rolling bass figure in 2/4 over which two semi-tuned electric guitars are noddling rhythm and blues.

   • 1987, John Schaefer, New sounds: a listener's guide to new music, page 89:

     The album is almost ruined by some muzak-style noddling for strings and keyboards.