Jeremy Diddler

English

Etymology

Name of a character in Raising the Wind, an 1803 play by James Kenney.

Noun

Jeremy Diddler (plural Jeremy Diddlers)

1. (dated) A needy, artful dealer; a confidence man.
   • 1854, Lucien Bonaparte Chase, English Serfdom and American Slavery:

     The Jeremy Diddlers will have designs upon your purse; the politicians upon your influence; and mammas, who have marriageable daughters, upon your person

Related terms

• diddle

References

• “diddler”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.