Also 6 tutt, -e, 9 Sc. tuts. β. 9 Sc. toot, tout; toots. [A natural utterance; the spelling tut sometimes represents the palatal click (also spelt TCHICK, TCK). Cf. also hut tut, hoot toot, hout tout s.v. HOOT int.] An ejaculation (often reduplicated) expressing impatience or dissatisfaction with a statement, notion, or proceeding, or contemptuously dismissing it. (The Sc. toot, toots, expresses mild expostulation.)
a. 1529. Skelton, Caudatos Anglos, 27. Shake thy tayle, Scot, lyke a cur, For thou beggest at euery mannes dur: Tut, Scot, I sey, Go shake thy dog, hey!
1536. in Strype, Eccl. Mem. (1721), I. xxxvi. 282. [He said, to what she had spoken, as it seems, in her own defence] Tut, tut, tut [and shaking his head three or four times].
a. 1553. Udall, Royster D., I. ii. (Arb.), 14. Tut I owe nought.
1580. Lupton, Sivqila, 18. Alteration (quoth you) tutte, it is wonderful.
1591. Troub. Raigne K. John (1611), 67. Tut, tut, my mercie serues to maime my selfe.
1599. Porter, Angry Wom. Abingt. (Percy Soc.), 57. Tut, tell not me of your impatience.
1601. Shaks., Jul. C., V. i. 7. Tut, I am in their bosomes, and I know Wherefore they do it.
1773. Goldsm., Stoops to Conq., V. i. I come,… once more, to ask pardon…. Tut, boy, a trifle.
1826. J. Wilson, Noct. Ambr., Wks. 1855, I. 200. North. I wish you would review these four volumes…. Shepherd. Tuts! What’s the use o’ reviewin?
1859. Thackeray, Virgin., xc. Tut, tut!… let us hear no more of this nonsense!
1865. ‘Lewis Carroll,’ Alice’s Adv., ix. ‘Tut, tut, child!’ said the Duchess. ‘Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.’
β. 1805. G. McIndoe, Poems, 71–2.
| But Guillie said, toots, | |
| We’ll have that there’s no doubts— | |
| Come reach us the flutes | |
| And we’ll play them a duet. |
1818. (Oct.) Scott, in Lockhart, Life, xlii. He … rebuked the Captain with ‘Toots, Adam! toots, Adam!’
1835. Carrick, Laird of Logan (1841), 137. Toot, man, haud your tongue.
1896–99. in Eng. Dial. Dict.
b. sb. The (or an) utterance of this exclamation, or a sound resembling this.
1676. Mace, Musicks Mon., 109. The Tut, is a Grace,… is a sudden taking away the Sound of any Note … in such a manner, as it will seem to cry Tut.
1894. Donovan, With Wilson in Matabeleland, 229. The incessant ‘tut-tut-tut’ of the Maxims. Ibid., 232. Each ‘tut-tut’ represents a bullet, at the rate of two to three hundred a minute.
1906. Daily Chron., 16 Jan., 6/7. There should be fixed stopping places [for motor-busses]…. They would save many Balfourian ‘Tut-tuts.’
Hence Tut v. intr., to utter the exclamation ‘tut.’
1832. Carrick, in Whistlebinkie (1890), I. 99. Toots, sic nonsense. You may toots awa, but it’s true sense, Mem.
1849. Lytton, Caxtons, VIII. iii. In another moment the member of Parliament had forgotten the statist, and was pishing and tutting over the Globe or the Sun.
1873. Miss Braddon, Str. & Pilgr., III. x. The doctors had simpered at her, and tut-tuted, and patted her gently on the head.
1894. Hall Caine, Manxman, V. ii. He laughed and tut-tutted.
