jig
To move briskly, especially as a danceTo move briskly, especially as a dance.
» When Tom saw Mary dancing a jig, he started laughing.
CK · Tatoeba · CC BY 2.0 FRMeaning
8 sensesTo move briskly, especially as a dance.
The guests were jigging around on the dance floor.
To move with a skip or rhythm; to move with vibrations or jerks.
To fish with a jig.
To sing to the tune of a jig.
To trick or cheat; to cajole; to delude.
To sort or separate, as ore in a jigger or sieve.
To cut or form, as a piece of metal, in a jigging machine.
To skip school or be truant.
- dance a quick dance with leaping and kicking motions
Examples
13 sentencesWhen Tom saw Mary dancing a jig, he started laughing.
Tom burst out laughing when he saw Mary dancing a jig.
deTom brach in Lachen aus, als er Maria Jig tanzen sah. — Pfirsichbaeumchen
At last the jig is up.
She didn't want the jig to be up.
The jig is up; let's face the music like men.
Origin
Unknown. Derivation from Middle English gyge (“fiddle”), from Old French gigue (“a fiddle”Unknown. Derivation from Middle English gyge (“fiddle”), from Old French gigue (“a fiddle”) has been proposed, but the connection and sense development are obscure. The sense “a type of dance” of modern French gigue is borrowed from English.
Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source
Forms
jigs, jigging, jigged, jiggedWord family
2 related wordsLessons for this word
3 lessons- A1Present simple — Because it is a verb
- A1Past simple, regular verbs — Because of its past form
- A2Present perfect: introduction — Because of its past participle
See also
neighbours in the dictionaryDictionary text adapted from Wiktionary (Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0) and Open English WordNet / Princeton WordNet (CC BY 4.0, WordNet License); shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. Example sentences and recordings are credited where they appear.