Word of the Day for Thursday, August 16, 2007
tattoo \ta-TOO\, noun:
1. A rapid, rhythmic drumming or rapping.
2. A beat of a drum, or sound of a trumpet or bugle, giving notice to soldiers to go to their quarters at night.
3. A display of military exercises given as evening entertainment.
Joss blew out her breath, stamped her feet in a short tattoo, and sat jiggling one leg.
— John Casey, The Half-life of Happiness
There are more golf courses per person in Naples than anywhere else in the world, and in spite of the hot, angry weather everyone around the hotel was dressed to play, their cleated shoes tapping out a clickety-clickety-clickety tattoo on the sidewalks.
— Susan Orlean, The Orchid Thief
With a steady tattoo of bad news beginning to offset what had been one of the most vibrant parts of the U.S. economy, “we are less optimistic than we were two months ago about the speed of the bounce back,” Mr. Williams said.
— Eduardo Porter, “California’s Economic Slowdown Is Expected to Last Much Longer”, Wall Street Journal, April 5, 2001
Tattoo is an alteration of earlier taptoo, from Dutch taptoe, “a tap(house)-shut,” from tap, “faucet” + toe, “shut” — meaning, essentially, that the tavern is about to shut.
From wikipedia
It is commonly believed that the original root word of “tattoo” comes from the Tongan or the Tahitian word tatau, meaning to mark or strike twice (the latter referring to traditional methods of applying the designs).[1] The first syllable “ta”, meaning “hand”, is repeated twice as an onomatopoeic reference to the repetitive nature of the action, and the final syllable “U” translates to “color”.[citation needed] The instrument used to pierce the skin in Polynesian tattooing is called a hahau, the syllable “ha” meaning to “strike or pierce”.[citation needed]