Noun: frazzle
| Singular | frazzle |
| Plural | frazzles |
Sample Sentences
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The bacon was burned to a frazzle.
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1886–90, John G. Nicolay and John Hay, Abraham Lincoln: A History
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Gordon had sent word to Lee that he had fought his corps to a frazzle
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Two years ago his nerves were worn to a frazzle over an attempt made to levy a tax. [1894 January 2nd, The Columbus Dispatch, Columbus:]
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My fingers are all cut to frazzles.. [1897, Rudyard Kipling, Captains Courageous (Chapter III)]
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The little girl, a little dancing imp with a frazzle of flying red hair and red-brown eyes. [1908, Alice MacGowan, Judith of the Cumberlands, page 29:]
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It ends with a splendid phone conversation between Robin and her mother. Robin (Laura Luz) is a frazzle of choreographed energy as her explanations are obviously leading to more trouble. [1980 December 20, Stewart Landers, “Triangle Produces Good Gay Theater”, in Gay Community News, volume 8, number 22, page 14:]
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This is getting to be a real frazzle. We've had more odd characters running around here since that girl moved in than I have the patience to deal with [2006, Mark Coggins, The Immortal Game, Big Earth Publishing, →ISBN, page 19:]
Nouns inflected like frazzle
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
1. Originally an East Anglian word. Either from a variant of the now obsolete fazle (“to unravel”), altered due to influence from fray, or from a blend of fazle and fray. fazle comes from earlier fasel, which was inherited from Middle English facelyn (“[of the end of a rope, or of cloth] to unravel”). Middle English facelyn was a verbal derivative of the noun fasylle (“frayed edge”), which was in turn a derivative (with the diminutive suffix -el) of Old English fæs (“fringe, border”), from Proto-West Germanic *fas, from Proto-Germanic *fasōn.
2. Related to German Faser (“fibre”). See: Old English Nouns '
fæs', German Nouns '
Faser'.