Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • A vocable imitating the vibration of a musical string: generally repeated, tum, tum. Compare tom-tom.
  • noun The stomach.
  • To card (wool) for the first time; according to Ray, to mix wool of divers colors.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun shortened form of tummy

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an enlarged and muscular saclike organ of the alimentary canal; the principal organ of digestion

Etymologies

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Examples

  • _Tum, tum, tum, tum_, another woman came down the steps, and stopped at the water's edge.

    Blackfoot Lodge Tales George Bird Grinnell 1893

  • _Tum, tum, tum, tum_, he could hear their footsteps as they came down the path, and he looked eagerly at every one.

    Blackfoot Lodge Tales George Bird Grinnell 1893

  • It was the sort of theme a wolf could appreciate, for it related to the free - dom of the great outdoors, the rolling bushes called tum - bleweeds drifting in the wind across the plain, cares of the world left behind.

    Juxtaposition Anthony, Piers 1982

  • It was the sort of theme a wolf could appreciate, for it related to the free - dom of the great outdoors, the rolling bushes called tum - bleweeds drifting in the wind across the plain, cares of the world left behind.

    Juxtaposition Anthony, Piers 1982

  • The fourth degree of possession is that given to the nearest cognates: the fifth is that called tum quam ex familia: the sixth, that given to the patron and patroness, their children and parents: the seventh, that given to the husband or wife of the deceased: the eighth, that given to cognates of the manumitter.

    The Institutes of Justinian John Baron Moyle 1891

  • 6 The possession of goods which formerly stood seventh in the list, which was called tum quam ex familia, and that which stood eighth, namely, the possession entitled unde liberi patroni patronaeque et parentes eorum, we have altogether suppressed by our constitution respecting the rights of patrons.

    The Institutes of Justinian John Baron Moyle 1891

  • The boy remained silent a few seconds and then said "tum" again.

    The Way of All Flesh Samuel Butler 1868

  • The child saw well what was coming now, was frightened, and, of course, said "tum" once more.

    The Way of All Flesh Samuel Butler 1868

  • Christopher Madin's (pre-recorded) music pitches from appropriately thrilling percussives (the tick-tock of the clock in the crocodile's tum) to swelling choruses that overwhelm the action.

    Peter Pan – review 2011

  • Why, when she played her one-two-three, tum-tum-tum, I was in the seventh heaven of bliss.

    THE PRINCESS 2010

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