Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

bicker

UK /ˈbɪkə/ · US /ˈbɪkɚ/ verb, noun, proper noun

Forms bickers bickering bickered

  1. verb To quarrel in a tiresome, insulting manner. “They bickered about dinner every evening.”
  2. verb To brawl or move tremulously, quiver, shimmer (of a water stream, light, flame, etc.)
  3. verb (of rain) To patter.
  4. verb To skirmish; to exchange blows; to fight.
  5. noun (countable) A skirmish; an encounter.
  6. noun (countable, Scotland, obsolete) A fight with stones between two parties of boys.
  7. noun A wrangle; also, a noise, as in angry contention.
  8. noun The process by which selective eating clubs at Princeton University choose new members.
  9. noun (Scotland) A wooden drinking-cup or other dish.
  10. proper noun A surname.

Synonyms

wrangle bickering spat tiff squabble pettifoggery fuss quibble niggle pettifog brabble

Etymology

From Middle English bikeren (“to attack”), from Middle Dutch bicken (“to stab, thrust, attack”) + -er (frequentative suffix), from Old Dutch *bikken, from Proto-West Germanic *bikkjan, from Proto-Germanic *bikjaną, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeg- (“to smash, break”).
See also Old English becca (“pickax”), Dutch bikken (“to hack”), German picken (“to peck, pick at”), Old Norse bikkja (“to plunge into water”); compare also German Low German bickern (“to nibble, gnaw”).

From Scots bicker, from Middle English biker. Doublet of beaker.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A small wooden vessel made of staves and hoops, like a tub. [Prov. Eng.]
  2. verb To skirmish; to exchange blows; to fight. [Obs.]
  3. verb To contend in petulant altercation; to wrangle.
  4. noun A skirmish; an encounter. [Obs.]

Etymology [See Beaker.]

Etymology [OE. bikeren, perh. fr. Celtic; cf. W. bicra to fight, bicker, bicre conflict, skirmish; perh. akin to E. beak.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “bicker”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details