. . . . . .'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
. . . . . .Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
. . . . . .All mimsy were the borogoves,
. . . . . .And the mome raths outgrabe.

"That's enough to begin with", Humpty Dumpty interrupted: "there are plenty of hard words there. ... "To 'gyre' is to go round and round like a gyroscope. To 'gimble' is to make holes like a gimlet."

In researching today's word 'trepan' I came across another word for a boring tool. OED defines wimble as simply a gimlet. Indeed, those words are related etymologically: OED says "gimlet ... mod.F. gibelet, a dim. of the word (unrecorded in the Rom. langs.) which appears in Eng. as WIMBLE." However, wimble has the additional meaning of 'active, nimble', which is not totally obscure: Spenser uses it in that sense.

Putting this together, Carrol's coinage of 'gimble' seems to evoke not only 'gimlet', as he notes, but also 'wimble', bringing in the sense of nimbleness.

Was this accidental or intended? Humpty Dumpty doesn't mention anything about 'wimble', but is there any reason to believe that Carroll knew that word, and may have had it in mind?

It's not a theory I've ever heard but it's possible.

The origin of this opening verse is actually quite interesting as it pre-dates Through the Looking Glass by sixteen years. Dodgson originally wrote in a private "periodical" that he wrote, lettered and illustrated himself to amuse his brothers and sisters.

He titled it "A Stanza of Anglo Saxon Poetry".

The meanings he attributes to the words differ from Humpty Dumpty's interpretation in several respects.

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BRYLLYG - from BRYL or BROIL, the time of "broiling dinner", i.e. the close of the afternoon.

SLYTHY - compound of SLIMY and LITHE - smooth and active

TOVE - a species of Badger. They had long smooth white hair, long hind legs and short horns like a stag, they lived chiefly on cheese.

GYRE verb, derived from GYAOUR or GIAOUR, a dog. To scratch like a dog

GYMBLE (whence GIMBLET) - to screw out holes in anything

MIMSY -(Whence MIMSERABLE and MISERABLE) Unhappy

BOROGOVE - An extinct kind of parrot. They had no wings, beaks turned up, and made their nests under sundials and lived on veal.

MOME (Hence SOLEMOME, SOLEMONE, SOLEMN) Grave

RATH A species of land turtle, head erect, mouth ;like a shark, forelegs curved out so that the animal walked on its knees, smooth green body, lived on swallows and oysters

OUTGRABE, past tense of OUTGRIBE It is connected with the verb to GRIKE or SHRIKE from which are derived Shriek and creak) Squeaked.

Hence the literal translation of the passage is "It was evening and the smooth active badgers were scratching and boring holes in the hill side. All unhappy were the parrots and the grave turtles squeaked out."
There were probably sundials on the top of the hill and the borogoves were afraid that their nests would be undermined. The hill was probably full of the nests of raths which ran out squeaking with fear on hearing the toves scratching outside. This is an obscure yet deeply affecting relic of ancient poetry.

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So Dodgson said anyway. A lengthy discussion of the poem can be found in Martin Gardner's Annotated Alice (Definitive Edition).

This message has been edited. Last edited by: BobHale,

I notice at least two words that ended up in the Harry Potter novels (I've read them all, aloud, twice):

Slythy -- Slytherin, one of the school houses
Mimsy -- one of the ghosts is named Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington (or similar -- don't have the books in front of me).