dandle

Word origin

Compare Scots dandill (“to dander; go about idly; move uncertainly; trifle”), English dialectal dander (“to wander about; talk incoherently; rave”), Middle Dutch dantinnen (“to trifle”) (from French dandiner (“to swing; waddle”)), German dändeln, tändeln (“to trifle, dandle”), Middle Dutch and Provincial German danten (“to do foolish things; trifle”), German Tand (“trifle, prattle”).

Used in a sentence

• “the young mother sat [the infant] upright in her lap, and[…]dandled it with a gloomy indifference.”

• “You will nurse and be carried on her arm and dandled on her knees.”

• “The book, thus dandled into popularity by bishops and good ladies, contained many pieces of nursery eloquence.”

Source: Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0