Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Balderdash |
BalderdashNoun1. Trivial nonsense. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "balderdash" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1677. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Literature | Balderdash Ribaldry, jargon. (Danish balder , tattle, clatter.). Source: Brewer's Dictionary. |
Slang in 1811 | BALDERDASH. Adulterated wine. Source: 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The game begins by all players rolling a die, the high roll chosen to be the first "dasher". The dasher draws a "definition card" from the supplied box, and rolls the die to decide which of the five words listed there shall be used (if a six is rolled, the dasher may choose for themselves which word to use. They then write down the real definition of the word (as supplied on the card) on a piece of paper. All other players then write down a definition, which may be an honest attempt to supply the correct definition, or, if they do not know or for tactical reasons decide not to, an imagined definition for the word designed to sound convincing as possible to other players.
The players hand their definitions to the dasher, who checks if any definitions are the same as the real definition. If there are, the player(s) submitting the correct definition is immediately awarded three points, and if there is more than one the round is abandoned (though the points are retained). The definitions, including the real definition, are then read out in random order. Players record which of the answers they believe is correct.
Players are awarded two points if they guess the correct definition, and one point for each player who incorrectly choose the fake definition they wrote. If nobody guesses the correct definition, the dasher is awarded three points.
For each point awarded, players move their tokens around the game board one square. The game continues, with players taking turns to be the dasher. The winner is the individual whose token reaches the end square first.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Balderdash."
Synonyms: BalderdashSynonyms: fiddle-faddle (n), piffle (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Unmeaningness | Nonsense, utter nonsense, gibberish; jargon, jabber, mere words, hocus-pocus, fustian, rant, bombast, balderdash, palaver, flummery, verbiage, babble, baverdage, baragouin, platitude, niaiserie; inanity; flap-doodle; rigmarole, rodomontade; truism; nugae canorae; twaddle, twattle, fudge, trash, garbage, humbug; stuff, stuff and nonsense; bosh, rubbish, moonshine, wish-wash, fiddle-faddle; absurdity; vagueness; (unintelligibility). |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Balderdash |
| English words defined with "balderdash": Nonsense verses. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Balderedash, my good woman, balderdash! He's no more evil than an alligator (The Valley of Gwangi; writing credit: William Bast; Julian More) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Music |
|
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| "Balderdash" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 83.33% of the time. "Balderdash" is used about 6 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 83.33% | 5 | 157,705 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 16.67% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 6 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
balderdash | 55 |
beyond balderdash | 13 |
balderdash game | 5 |
balderdash board game | 2 |
balderdash online | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "balderdash"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | gjepura (apple sauce, baloney, blague, blether, boloney, bosh, bunco, buncombe, bunk, bunko, claptrap, crap, drivel, drool, eyewash, fiddledeedee, fiddle-faddle, fiddlesticks, flam, flannel, flapdoodle, flimflam, flubdub, footle, galimatias, gammon, hog-wash, hokum, humbug, jazz, jiggery pokery, moonshine, nonsense, palaver, piffle, poppycock, punk, rot, rubbish, stuff and nonsense, taradiddle, tosh, trash, twaddle, vacuity, waffle, wish-wash), dokrra (drivel, drool, flummery, footle, moonshine, poppycock). (various references) | |
Arabic | كلام فارغ (bosh, bunk, drivel, empty talk, fiddle-faddle, idle talk, nonsense, poppycock, prattle, twaddle), هراء (baloney, boloney, bosh, bull, bunk, claptrap, drivel, fiddle-faddle, flapdoodle, fudge, hocus pocus, humbug, moonshine, nonsense, piffle, piffling, ramble, rigmarole, rot, rubbish, slush, tosh, trash, trumpery, wind). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | глупости (all my eye, applesauce, baloney, blague, blah, bleat, blether, boloney, bosh, bull, buncombe, cod, crap, drivel, eyewash, fiddle-faddle, fiddlesticks, flapdoodle, footle, fudge, guff, gup, hokum, humbug, jiggery pokery, junk, kibosh, monkey business, monkeybusiness, nonsense, nuts, piffle, poppycock, punk, rhubarb, rot, rubbish, shucks, slush, stuff and nonsense, tack, tommy rot, truck, trumpery), мръсотии (filth). (various references) | |
Czech | nesmysl (absurdity, bunk, nonsense, nuts, rot, rubbish, tripe, trumpery). (various references) | |
Finnish | korulause (empty phrases, high-sounding phrase). (various references) | |
French | balivernes (ballyhoo), galimatias. (various references) | |
German | Quatsch (baloney, bilge, blah, bull, bunk, bunkum, fiddle-faddle, flubdub, garbage, gibberish, hogwash, hooey, jabberwocky, malarkey, nonsense, poppycock, rubbish, shucks, trash, twaddle). (various references) | |
Greek | ανοησίεσ (claptrap, fiddlesticks, hooey, moonshine, nonsense, piffle, rubbish, stuff, twaddle), τρίχεσ (balls, pile, strand). (various references) | |
Hebrew | שטויות (applesauce, baloney, bunk, drivel, moonshine, nonsense, nuts, rot, rubbish, stuff and nonsense, tommyrot, tosh, trash, trumpery), "ברי "בל (hot air, nonsense). (various references) | |
Hungarian | értelmetlen zagyvalék (farrago of nonsense). (various references) | |
Indonesian | bahasa meraban. (various references) | |
Italian | sciocchezze (applesauce, baloney, bosh, nuts, poppycock, rot, rubbish, shucks, tripe), sciocchezza (flapdoodle, Folly, foolish thing, foolishness, idiocy, malarkey, nonsense, silliness, stupidity, trash, trifle), frottole (jazz), corbellerie, ciance; frottole. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | alderdashbay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | lengalenga (spiel), disparate (absurdity, blather, blether, bloomer, bosh, bull, bunk, disparate, fiddle-de-dee, fiddlestick, flapdoodle, flummery, foolery, foolishness, fribble, fudge, guff, gup, hot, howler, moonshine, mush, nonsense, piffle, punk, simplicity, skittle, tomfoolery, tommy rot, tripe, tump, twaddle, unreason, unwisdom). (various references) | |
Romanian | baliverne (bumkum, fiddlesticks, stuff), prostii (apple-sauce, bosh, drivel, eyewash, fiddle-faddle, fiddlesticks, fudge, gammon, moonshine, mush, nonsense, poppy-cock, rats, rubbish, skittles, stuff and nonsense, tosh, trash, tripe), galimatic. (various references) | |
Russian | вздор (all my eye, baloney, blah, boloney, bosh, fiddlesticks, flimflam, fudge, gammon, humbug, jiggery pokery, kibosh, mush, nonsense, poppycock, rot, rubbish, tommy rot, tommyrot, tosh). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | besmislica (applesauce, blah, blether, bosh, bull, bunkum, double dutch, double talk, extravagance, fiddlestick, flubdub, mush, nonsense, pointlessness, ruck, tosh), besmisleno (absurdly). (various references) | |
Spanish | monserga, machaqueria (malarkey), galimatías (double dutch, rigmarole), disparates (a load of piffle, absurdities, humbug, jazz, nonsense). (various references) | |
Swedish | strunt (blah, bosh, fiddlededee, garbage, piffle, pipsqueak, punk, rot, rubbish, squirt), gallimatias. (various references) | |
Turkish | boş lâf (applesauce, babble, bosh, bunkum, comment, empty words, falderal, fiddle, fiddle-de-dee, flimflam, flubdub, flummery, froth, fudge, gab, galimatias, garbage, gas, guff, haver, hokum, hooey, hot air, inanity, jazz, lark, moonshine, palaver, poppycock, punk, routine, small talk, talky-talk, tripe, vaporings, vapourings, waffle, wind, wishy-wash), zırva (baloney, bilge, blather, blether, boloney, bosh, bull, bunk, bunkum, eyewash, fiddle, fiddle-de-dee, fiddle-faddle, fiddlesticks, flapdoodle, flimflam, gammon, garbage, gassing, hooey, jabber wocky, nonsense, punk, raving, ravings, rot, rubbish, stuff, tommyrot, twaddle), saçmalık (absurdity, applesauce, bilge, blather, blatherskite, blether, bosh, drivel, extravagance, eyewash, farce, fatuity, fiddle-faddle, flapdoodle, flimflam, flubdub, footle, gab, galimatias, gassing, gibberish, guff, hog-wash, hokum, hooey, inanity, ineptitude, ineptness, insanity, irrationality, lark, malarkey, moonshine, nonsense, piffle, poppycock, punk, rot, rubbish, shenanigan, silliness, spinach, stuff, talkee-talkee, the irrational, trash, triviality, twaddle, vacuity, whimsicality, whimsicalness, wind, wishy-wash). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | нісенітниця (applesauce, bilge, blah, bosh, drivel, flam, flubdub, haver, jiggery pokery, nonsense, shucks, slaver, tommyrot), лихослів'я (detraction, evil-speaking, filth, obloquy, ribaldry, slander, whispering), бурда (cat-lap, slipslop, wash, wish-wash), дурниця (absurdity, absurdness, applesauce, ballyhoo, bosh, buncombe, froth, humbug, mush, nonsense, piffle, poppycock, porridge, rigmarole, rubbish, sappiness, shucks, slum, trash, tripe). (various references) | |
Vietnamese | lời nói vô nghĩa không ra đầu v o đâu, lời nói bậy bạ nhảm nhí. (various references) | |
Welsh | baldordd (babble, clamor), lol (bosh, nonsense), ffregod, ffiloreg (nonsense, rigamarole). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "balderdash": balderdashes. (additional references) | |
| |
"Balderdash" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: baulderdash, bladerdash, bulderdash. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "balderdash" (pronounced bô"lderda'sh) |
| 3 | -d a' sh | slapdash. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-b-d-d-e-h-l-r-s" | |
-1 letter: baldheads. | |
-2 letters: ashlared, baldhead, bladders, halberds, sharable. | |
-3 letters: abashed, abraded, abrades, addable, arables, bharals, bladder, daledhs, halberd, heralds, herbals, ladders, raddles, saddler, sraddha. | |
-4 letters: abased, abaser, abrade, adders, addles, alders, arable, ardebs, ashlar, ashler, badder, balded, balder, balers, barded, bardes, bashed, basher, beards, bharal, bladed, blades, blared, blares, blears, breads, daedal, daledh, dashed, dasher. | |
-5 letters: aahed. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-a-b-d-d-e-h-l-r-s" | |
+2 letters: balderdashes. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions: Internet 8. Translations: Modern | 9. Derivations 10. Rhymes 11. Anagrams 12. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
