dicker

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day

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🗓️ 8 July 2024

⏱️ 1 minutes

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Summary

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 8, 2024 is:

dicker • \DIK-er\ • verb

To dicker is to talk or argue with someone about the conditions of a purchase, agreement, or contract.

// My favorite thing about flea markets is dickering over prices.

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Examples:

“They haggled and dickered and bargained through a good number of dealerships.” — Terry Woster, Tri-State Neighbor (Sioux Falls, South Dakota), 7 Dec. 2023

Did you know?

The origins of the verb dicker likely lie in an older dicker, the noun referring to a quantity of ten animal hides or skins. The idea is that the verb arose from the bartering of, and haggling over, animal hides on the American frontier. The noun dicker comes from decuria, the Latin word for a bundle of ten hides, and ultimately from the Latin word decem, meaning "ten." The word entered Middle English as dyker and by the 14th century had evolved to dicker.

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's Merriam-Webster's word of the day for July 8th.
0:11.6	Today's word is Dicker, spelled DI-C-K-E-R- Dicker is a verb. To Dicker is to talk or
0:18.1	argue with someone about the conditions of a purchase agreement or contract. Here's the word used in a sentence from the
0:25.2	tri-state neighbor of Sioux Falls. They haggled and dickered and bargained through a
0:31.2	good number of dealerships. The origins of the word Dicker
0:36.2	likely lie in an older word Dicker, the noun referring to a quantity of 10 animal hides or skins. The idea is that the verb arose
0:46.1	from the bartering of and haggling over animal hides on the American frontier.
0:51.9	The noun Dicker comes from
0:54.1	de Kuria, the Latin word for a bundle of ten hides and ultimately from the
0:59.5	Latin word de Khem meaning ten. The word entered middle English as diker and by the 14th century had evolved to
1:08.1	Dicker. With your word of the day, I'm Peter Sokolowski. Visit Marion Webster.com today for definitions, word play, and trending word lookups.

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