Also 6 twancle, 9 dial. twankle (Eng. Dial. Dict.). [dim. and freq. of TWANG v.1 (see -LE), describing a resonant sound of the nature of a twang, but thinner and continuous or repeated. Used with contemptuous force.]
1. intr. Of a stringed instrument or one who plays it: To twang lightly and continuously or frequently; to jingle.
1558. Phaër, Æneid, VI. R ij b. Rimes thei sown And Orpheus among them stands, as priest in trayling gown. And twancling makes them tune.
1576–1610. [see TWANGLING ppl. a.].
1823. Scott, Peveril, xxii. The coxcomb is twangling it on the lute.
1824. Blackw. Mag., XV. 160. The guitar … is twangling on every side.
1868. Tennyson, Last Tourn., 251. He twangled on his harp.
2. trans. To twang (a stringed instrument) lightly; to play upon in a petty or trifling manner. Also to play (a melody) in this way. Also fig.
1607. [see twangling vbl. sb.].
1829. Scott, Anne of G., xxx. The King looked after him, with some wonder at this want of breeding,… and then again began to twangle his viol.
1840. Thackeray, Shabby Genteel Story, ii. The young Andrea bears up gaily…; twangles his guitar.
1874. Ruskin, Fors Clav., xlvii. 259. To … find you a barrel-organ, or a harmonium, to twangle psalm-tunes on.
Hence Twangling vbl. sb.; also Twangler, one who twangles.
1594. Lyly, Moth. Bomb., V. iii. What a mischiefe make the twanglers [fiddlers] here?
1607. Hieron, Wks., I. 104. Not the twangling of religion vpon the tongue, but the practise of holinesse in the life.
1825. Scott, Betrothed, xxi. Such twangling of harps as would be enough to frighten our walls from their foundations.
1871. Ruskin, Fors Clav., vi. 17. He supposed David’s ‘twangling upon the harp’ would have been unsatisfactory to modern taste.
1879. E. Arnold, Lt. Asia, I. (1881), 7. Beaters of drum, and twanglers of the wire.
1881. Ruskin, in Mather, Life (1897), 102. A twangler or scratcher on keys or cat-gut.
1891. Farrar, Darkn. & Dawn, lxiii. Vindex … described Nero as a wretched twangler on the harp.
