caffle

Alteration of cavil.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkæfl̩/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkæf(ə)l/
• Rhymes: -æfəl
• Hyphenation: caf‧fle

caffle (third-person singular simple present caffles, present participle caffling, simple past and past participle caffled)

1. (dialectal, Northern England, Ireland) To wrangle, to argue, to quarrel.
2. (dialectal, Northern England, Ireland) To entangle.
3. (dialectal, Northern England) To prevaricate; to change one's mind.
   • 1876, Memoir Rev. J. Gregory, page 25, quoted in the EDD:

     Neither snow nor rain could prevent him from going, for he hated caffling.

   • 1886, Notes and Queries, page 67:

     Mr. W—, after some caffling, declared he did not say so and so.

   • 1889, Mabel Geraldine W. Peacock, North Lincolnshire dialect. Taales fra Linkisheere, page 38:

     An' he caffles, an' slews, an' weant saay nowt stright oot aboot munny; an' thaay niver gets to knaw how things is to be left.

   • 1889, Edward Peacock, A Glossary of Words Used in the Wapentakes of Manley and Corringham, Lincolnshire, page 89:

     He caffled a bit when he was afoore th' magistrates, bud it were to noä good.

4. (dialectal, Northern England, Ireland) To cheat.

• caffler

• → Welsh: cafflo (“to cheat”)

• “caffle”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.