Definitions

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

  • intransitive verb To make a tinkling or ringing metallic sound.
  • intransitive verb To have the catchy sound of a simple, repetitious rhyme or doggerel.
  • intransitive verb To cause to make a tinkling or ringing metallic sound.
  • noun The sound produced by or as if by bits of metal striking together.
  • noun A piece of light singsong verse or rhyme.
  • noun A catchy, often musical advertising slogan.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A two-wheeled car (like the Irish jingle) used in some parts of Australia.
  • noun A tinkling or clinking sound, as of little bells or pieces of metal.
  • noun Something that jingles; a little bell or rattle; specifically, one of the little metallic disks set in the frame of a tambourine.
  • noun Musical or sprightly sound in verse or rimes; poetry or a poem having a musical or sprightly sound, with little sense; a catching array of words, whether verse or prose.
  • noun A covered two-wheeled car used in the south of Ireland.
  • noun A mollusk of the genus Anomia.
  • To emit tinkling metallic sounds; tinkle or clink, as bells, coins, chains, spurs, keys, or other metallic objects.
  • To have a musical sound, or a light pleasing effect upon the ear, independently of sense, as verse or rimes.
  • To cause to give a tinkling metallic sound, as a little bell or as pieces of metal.

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

  • transitive verb To cause to give a sharp metallic sound as a little bell, or as coins shaken together; to tinkle.
  • noun A rattling, clinking, or tinkling sound, as of little bells or pieces of metal.
  • noun That which makes a jingling sound, as a rattle.
  • noun A correspondence of sound in rhymes, especially when the verse has little merit
  • noun See Gold shell (b), under Gold.
  • intransitive verb To sound with a fine, sharp, rattling, clinking, or tinkling sound.
  • intransitive verb To rhyme or sound with a jingling effect.

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

  • noun The sound of metal or glass clattering against itself.
  • noun A short tune or verse, especially one used to advertise something.
  • noun A carriage drawn by horses.
  • verb To make a noise of metal or glass clattering against itself.
  • verb To cause to make a noise of metal or glass clattering against itself.

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

  • verb make a sound typical of metallic objects
  • noun a metallic sound
  • noun a comic verse of irregular measure

Etymologies

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

[Middle English ginglen, of imitative origin.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

(onomatopoeia); compare jangle.

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Examples

  • Special thanks to Kosta Andreadis for our awesome title jingle!

    IGN Complete 2010

  • Into his head had come a new mantra, a jingle from a commercial on TV when he was growing up, a child of baseball fields and macadam basketball courts with their bent and rusted hoops and the intense otherworldly green of a New York summer, a green so multivalent and assertive it was like a promise of life to come.

    The Silence 2010

  • One thing is for sure; it has nothing whatever to do with the mealy mouthed jingle from the Home Office called the Policing Pledge.

    The Italian Job « POLICE INSPECTOR BLOG Inspector Gadget 2009

  • Into his head had come a new mantra, a jingle from a commercial on TV when he was growing up, a child of baseball fields and macadam basketball courts with their bent and rusted hoops and the intense otherworldly green of a New York summer, a green so multivalent and assertive it was like a promise of life to come.

    The Silence 2010

  • Into his head had come a new mantra, a jingle from a commercial on TV when he was growing up, a child of baseball fields and macadam basketball courts with their bent and rusted hoops and the intense otherworldly green of a New York summer, a green so multivalent and assertive it was like a promise of life to come.

    The Silence 2010

  • The old Toffifay candy commercial jingle is something that really offended me as a kid.

    All Singing, All Snacking : Scrubbles.net 2007

  • The old Toffifay candy commercial jingle is something that really offended me as a kid.

    2007 October : Scrubbles.net 2007

  • Liberals should stop kidding themselves that some kind of brilliant silver-bullet new jingle is going to turn everything around and stay focused on doing the harder job of changing the underlying attitudes.

    Battle of the Participles 2006

  • This jingle is comedy gold, folks, especially the razzle-dazzle way the unknown little boy (possibly a girl) singer delivers it.

    The Children’s Half-Hour : Scrubbles.net 2006

  • From "The irresistible, singable, stick-in-your-mindable jingle is dead" (Boston Globe):

    Winter scenes M-mv 2005

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