Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Any of various small-headed drums, usually long and narrow, that are beaten with the hands.
- n. A monotonous rhythmical drumbeat or similar sound.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A circular dye-vat constructed in such a way that a series of upright mallets may be made to pound upon the material placed within it and thus work the dye-liquor well into the fiber. Largely used in hosierydyeing, particularly in the application of aniline black.
- n. In India, the drum used by musicians, jugglers, public criers, etc.
- n. Same as gong, 1.
- To beat on a tom-tom.
Wiktionary
- n. onomatopoeia A small joined pair of drums, beaten with the hands.
- n. usually as a pair Any cylindrical drum, with no snare; part of a drum kit.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. See tam-tam.
WordNet 3.0
- n. any of various drums with small heads
Etymologies
- Hindi ṭamṭam, probably of imitative origin. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The shortcut may be setting yourself up for a trance by entrainment with a metronome-like pitter-patter of a tom-tom drum.”
“From his lead-singer position Mr. Clausen plays a tom-tom, a crash cymbal and an electronic drum pad, and frequently wanders over to bang on a drum kit with Mr. Husmer.”
“The stone came down with a thump on the white meat, and thereafter arose and fell in a sort of tom-tom accompaniment to the poet's song:”
“I can play one beat on a tom-tom, and that might set me off.”
“And headlining at midnight, the cocky and excellent Thee Satisfaction with a new batch of tom-tom computer beats.”
“From the living room floor where she sat, cross-legged, with her tom-tom drum on her lap and the bottle set out before her, the Mysteress began her song-chant.”
“I used brushes on the snare drum with my right hand and a soft mallet on the tom-tom with my left," he said.”
“Then I'd hit the floor tom-tom on the same beat as the snare.”
“Its brilliantly evoked opening describes a shabby rooming house in which "spacious rooms had been sliced to cubicles where the staccato chatter of the inmates, relayed like tom-tom messages, mingled with the crash of irreconcilable radios.”
“Enough banging on that particular tom-tom for now.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘tom-tom’.
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Sounds
words that describe sound
atchoo, atishoo, babble, bam, bay, beep, blast, blather, bleat, bleep, blip, bong and 242 more...
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Reduples
Go for it, brothers and sisters! I personally have been suffering long for lack of an open reduplicatives list
happy clappy, bribble-brabble, diddle-daddle, hugger-mugger, kikiriki, Bora-Bora, mahi-mahi, jingle-jangle, knick-knack paddy..., chit-chat, bon-bon, clapperclaw and 292 more...
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Hyphenated Repeats
Exactly reduplicated words connected by a hyphen.
aye-aye, cleek-cleek, arc-arc, killy-killy, dum-dum, tom-tom, argon-argon, carbon-carbon, win-win, lose-lose, bye-bye, choo-choo and 113 more...
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Words next
patrimony, cacophony, fearsome, coruscating, coruscating, coruscating, dolomite, dolorous, transdermal, chatty cathy, chatterbox, incessantly and 249 more...
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Bengali words in English
juggernaut, jute, bungalow, pajama, loot, pundit, sherbet, tom-tom, avatar, guru, cushy
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Nick nacks
I started a list on the Wordie with a different log-in and now I can't find it. Sigh. So I'm starting again. These are monosyllabic double barrels that I like the sound of. Part of our human instin...
riff-raff, ping-pong, hip-hop, flim-flam, op cit, tip-top, mish-mash, flap-dash, nick-nack, lap-top, can-can, slap-dash and 60 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for tom-tom.
john See also tom tom. Oct 1, 2010