tinker

From Middle English tinkere, perhaps from Old English *tincere, from tin (“tin”) + Old English *cere (as in bēocere (“beekeeper”)), from Proto-Germanic *kazjaz (“vessel-maker”), from Proto-Germanic *kazą (“vessel; vat; tub”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /tɪŋkə(ɹ)/

• Audio (US)

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• Hyphenation: tin‧ker
• Rhymes: -ɪŋkə(r)

tinker (plural tinkers)

1. An itinerant tinsmith and mender of household utensils made of metal.
2. (dated, chiefly Britain and Ireland, offensive) A member of the Irish Traveller community. A gypsy.
3. (usually with "little") A mischievous person, especially a playful, impish youngster.
4. Someone who repairs, or attempts repair, on anything mechanical, or who invents such devices; one who tinkers; a tinkerer.
5. The act of repair or invention. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
6. (military, obsolete) A hand mortar.
7. Any of various fish: the chub mackerel, the silverside, the skate, or a young mackerel about two years old.
8. A bird, the razor-billed auk.

• (mischievous person): rapscallion, rascal, rogue, scamp, scoundrel
• (member of the travelling community): traveller

tinker (third-person singular simple present tinkers, present participle tinkering, simple past and past participle tinkered)

1. (intransitive) To fiddle with something in an attempt to fix, mend or improve it, especially in an experimental or unskilled manner.
   • 2012 January 1, Robert M. Pringle, “How to Be Manipulative”, in American Scientist‎, volume 100, number 1, page 31:

     As in much of biology, the most satisfying truths in ecology derive from manipulative experimentation. Tinker with nature and quantify how it responds.

2. (intransitive) To work as a tinker.

• tinker, tailor
• tinker's damn

• tinker in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

• Kinter, reknit