See damp squib in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for damp squib meaning in English (5.6kB)
{
"categories": [],
"forms": [
{
"form": "damp squibs",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "damp squib (plural damp squibs)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"glosses": [
"A firework that has been wet and therefore fails to go off correctly."
],
"id": "en-damp_squib-en-noun-~y8zKVHB",
"links": [
[
"firework",
"firework"
],
[
"go off",
"go off"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(literally) A firework that has been wet and therefore fails to go off correctly."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"_dis1": "65 35",
"word": "wet firecracker"
},
{
"_dis1": "65 35",
"word": "dud"
}
],
"tags": [
"literally"
],
"translations": [
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "da",
"lang": "Danish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "fuser"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "sisser"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "suutari"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "pétard mouillé"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Blindgänger"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Versager"
},
{
"_dis1": "90 10",
"code": "ga",
"lang": "Irish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "urchar iomrallach"
}
]
},
{
"categories": [],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1858 May 29, The Launceston Examiner, Tasmania, page 6, column 2",
"text": "The anonymous oracle, the author of this pamphlet, is an example of entertaining dullness. He has manufactured a very damp squib; he is a serious man in motley; and practical ideas occasionally drop in among his fantastic vaticinations.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1999 June 30, Fiachra Gibbons, quoting John Calder, “Arts and science ‘damp squib’”, in The Guardian",
"text": "It sounds very token, another damp squib which will probably end up benefiting more bureaucrats than artists or scientists.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2012 December 29, Paul Doyle, “Arsenal's Theo Walcott hits hat-trick in thrilling victory over Newcastle”, in The Guardian",
"text": "Arsène Wenger confessed: \"The result was not an accurate indication of the match.\" Certainly, at half-time it seemed unlikely that Arsenal would catch fire so spectacularly because the first half was a damp squib of a display from Wenger's team, as Newcastle initially showed no ill-effects from their Old Trafford ordeal.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2012 December 30, Mark O'Connell, “Both Flesh and Not by David Foster Wallace – review”, in The Observer, →ISSN",
"text": "A third collection of David Foster Wallace's essays contains genius and damp squibs[.]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2013, Alistair Moffat, Susan Mansfield, Alexander Smith, The Great Tapestry of Scotland: The Making of a Masterpiece",
"text": "That whole campaign was a damp squib, they cranked it up as a real possibility that Scotland might win, and when we actually got there it didn't happen like that, and everybody came home quite early with their tails between their legs.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2017 July 17, Yasmeen Serhan, quoting Guy Verhofstadt, “One Issue That Could Break the Brexit Talks”, in The Atlantic",
"text": "Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s Brexit coordinator, took the criticism one step further, dubbing the U.K. proposal a “damp squib” that reduces Europeans to “the status of ‘third-country nationals’ in the U.K., with fewer rights than British citizens are offered throughout the EU.”",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Anything that doesn’t work properly, or fails to come up to expectations; a dud."
],
"id": "en-damp_squib-en-noun-wfd6dvP8",
"links": [
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"properly",
"properly"
],
[
"fails",
"fails"
],
[
"expectation",
"expectation"
],
[
"dud",
"dud"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic, by extension) Anything that doesn’t work properly, or fails to come up to expectations; a dud."
],
"tags": [
"broadly",
"idiomatic"
],
"translations": [
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"word": "suutari"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"word": "pétard mouillé"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Schuss in den Ofen"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Reinfall"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Schlag ins Wasser"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Rohrkrepierer"
},
{
"_dis1": "5 95",
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "niewypał"
}
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-damp squib.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/9f/En-au-damp_squib.ogg/En-au-damp_squib.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/En-au-damp_squib.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "damp squib"
}
{
"categories": [
"English countable nouns",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English nouns",
"English terms with audio links"
],
"forms": [
{
"form": "damp squibs",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "damp squib (plural damp squibs)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"glosses": [
"A firework that has been wet and therefore fails to go off correctly."
],
"links": [
[
"firework",
"firework"
],
[
"go off",
"go off"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(literally) A firework that has been wet and therefore fails to go off correctly."
],
"tags": [
"literally"
]
},
{
"categories": [
"English idioms",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "1858 May 29, The Launceston Examiner, Tasmania, page 6, column 2",
"text": "The anonymous oracle, the author of this pamphlet, is an example of entertaining dullness. He has manufactured a very damp squib; he is a serious man in motley; and practical ideas occasionally drop in among his fantastic vaticinations.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "1999 June 30, Fiachra Gibbons, quoting John Calder, “Arts and science ‘damp squib’”, in The Guardian",
"text": "It sounds very token, another damp squib which will probably end up benefiting more bureaucrats than artists or scientists.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2012 December 29, Paul Doyle, “Arsenal's Theo Walcott hits hat-trick in thrilling victory over Newcastle”, in The Guardian",
"text": "Arsène Wenger confessed: \"The result was not an accurate indication of the match.\" Certainly, at half-time it seemed unlikely that Arsenal would catch fire so spectacularly because the first half was a damp squib of a display from Wenger's team, as Newcastle initially showed no ill-effects from their Old Trafford ordeal.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2012 December 30, Mark O'Connell, “Both Flesh and Not by David Foster Wallace – review”, in The Observer, →ISSN",
"text": "A third collection of David Foster Wallace's essays contains genius and damp squibs[.]",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2013, Alistair Moffat, Susan Mansfield, Alexander Smith, The Great Tapestry of Scotland: The Making of a Masterpiece",
"text": "That whole campaign was a damp squib, they cranked it up as a real possibility that Scotland might win, and when we actually got there it didn't happen like that, and everybody came home quite early with their tails between their legs.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2017 July 17, Yasmeen Serhan, quoting Guy Verhofstadt, “One Issue That Could Break the Brexit Talks”, in The Atlantic",
"text": "Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s Brexit coordinator, took the criticism one step further, dubbing the U.K. proposal a “damp squib” that reduces Europeans to “the status of ‘third-country nationals’ in the U.K., with fewer rights than British citizens are offered throughout the EU.”",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Anything that doesn’t work properly, or fails to come up to expectations; a dud."
],
"links": [
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"properly",
"properly"
],
[
"fails",
"fails"
],
[
"expectation",
"expectation"
],
[
"dud",
"dud"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic, by extension) Anything that doesn’t work properly, or fails to come up to expectations; a dud."
],
"tags": [
"broadly",
"idiomatic"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-damp squib.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/9f/En-au-damp_squib.ogg/En-au-damp_squib.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/En-au-damp_squib.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "wet firecracker"
},
{
"word": "dud"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "da",
"lang": "Danish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "fuser"
},
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "sisser"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "suutari"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"word": "pétard mouillé"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Blindgänger"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Versager"
},
{
"code": "ga",
"lang": "Irish",
"sense": "firework that fails to go off, due to wetting",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "urchar iomrallach"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"word": "suutari"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"word": "pétard mouillé"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Schuss in den Ofen"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Reinfall"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Schlag ins Wasser"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Rohrkrepierer"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"sense": "anything that doesn’t work properly",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "niewypał"
}
],
"word": "damp squib"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-04-13 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-04-01 using wiktextract (ee658f9 and be4df6b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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