English

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Etymology

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From chirt +‎ -le.

Verb

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churtle (third-person singular simple present churtles, present participle churtling, simple past and past participle churtled)

  1. To chirp.
    • 1894, Albert Gibson, Robert McLean, editors, Law Notes, volume 13, Reeves & Turner, page 132:
      The staff of the Law Notes is amused; even the office cat was observed to wink and his purr sounded suspiciously like a “feline churtle”.
    • 1992, Turkish Reflections: A Biography of a Place, page 104:
      When we went there in the morning, there was, all through the mosque, a sound of chanting like doves churtling.
    • 2020 February 20, Dale A. Zimmerman, David J. Pearson, Donald A. Turner, “BULBULS”, in Birds of Kenya and Northern Tanzania, Bloomsbury Publishing, COMMON or DARK-CAPPED BULBUL, page 434:
      Songs involve repetition of one note: churtle-churtle-churtle-churtle or wurtilee-wurtilee-wurtilee given separately or intermingled.

References

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churtle”, in OED Online  , Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.