NOUN
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a conical child's plaything tapering to a steel point on which it can be made to spin
he got a bright red top and string for his birthday
How To Use teetotum In A Sentence
- Maurice Mair seemed to spin like a teetotum and pitch upon his face like a ninepin. The Complete Father Brown
- In England and Ireland, the game of totum or teetotum, first mentioned in approximately 1500, was especially popular at Christmastime.
- Each player places a coin in the pot and then take turns spinning the teetotum following the instructions when the teetotum stops spinning.
- To reinforce this, the games were played with teetotums, rather than dice which were associated with gambling.
- While heaping these compliments on Mr Flintwinch, he rolled him about with a hand on each of his shoulders, until the staggerings of that gentleman, who under the circumstances was dryer and more twisted than ever, were like those of a teetotum nearly spent. Little Dorrit
- However, variations of the game were invented when teetotums developed a body in the shape of a cube.
- Maurice Mair seemed to spin like a teetotum and pitch upon his face like a ninepin. The Complete Father Brown
- I had seen a set of models of the regular polyhedra in my High School trig class, and decided that a “12-sided teetotum” must be the 12-sdied thingy (a regular dodecahedron) I had seen in the set. The Braunstein Game « Isegoria
- A round teetotum revolving on its point represents the sky turning on its axis, the two points of the teetotum are the two poles; the child will be delighted to find one of them, and I show him the tail of the Little bear. Emile
- A six-sided teetotum or die and a playing piece of a different color for each player, are also needed.