Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To talk idly and at length; chatter.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To talk idly or boastfully; be loquacious; chatter; babble.
  • To utter foolishly; chatter.
  • noun Idle or childish talk; prattle; unmeaning loquacity; twaddle.
  • noun Synonyms See prattle.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To utter foolishly; to speak without reason or purpose; to chatter, or babble.
  • intransitive verb To talk much and to little purpose; to be loquacious; to speak foolishly; to babble.
  • noun Talk to little purpose; trifling talk; unmeaning loquacity.

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

  • noun Talk to little purpose; trifling talk; unmeaning loquacity.
  • verb To talk much and to little purpose; to chatter; to be loquacious; to speak foolishly; to babble.

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

  • verb speak (about unimportant matters) rapidly and incessantly
  • noun idle or foolish and irrelevant talk

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English praten, from Middle Dutch prāten.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English 15th century praten, from Middle Dutch, akin to Middle Low German pratten. Cognate with Swedish: prata.

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Examples

Comments

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  • "This is what the Republican Party has done to us this year: It has placed within reach of the Oval Office a woman who is a religious fanatic and a proud, boastful ignoramus. Those who despise science and learning are not anti-elitist. They are morally and intellectually slothful people who are secretly envious of the educated and the cultured. And those who prate of spiritual warfare and demons are not just 'people of faith' but theocratic bullies. On Nov. 4, anyone who cares for the Constitution has a clear duty to repudiate this wickedness and stupidity."

    - Christopher Hitchens, 'Sarah Palin's War on Science', slate.com, 27 Oct 2008.

    October 30, 2008

  • for he that prates his secrets,

    his heart stands on the outside

    The Revenger's Tragedy

    I wonder how that links to the quote above...

    March 23, 2009

  • "There's no man in the world

    More bound to's mother; yet here he lets me prate

    Like one i' the stocks."

    - William Shakespeare, 'The Tragedy of Coriolanus'.

    August 29, 2009