2007-09-20 02:43:24 · 6 answers · asked by monkeyhead 1 in Education & Reference ➔ Words & Wordplay
According to the American Heritage dictionary, it's origin is unknown.
It means
1. In disorderly haste; confusedly; pell-mell. 2. Haphazardly.
ADJECTIVE: 1. Carelessly hurried and confused. 2. Haphazard.
NOUN: Turmoil; confusion.
ETYMOLOGY: Origin unknown.
Wikipedia points out that a helter skelter is an amusement park ride with a slide built in a spiral around a high tower. Users climb the tower and slide down usually on a mat. It is the precursor to the water slide. The term is primarily (but not exclusively) found in British English.
Dictionary.com defines as below, but does show an origin for it.
–adverb 1. in headlong and disorderly haste: The children ran helter-skelter all over the house.
2. in a haphazard manner; without regard for order: Clothes were scattered helter-skelter about the room.
–adjective 3. carelessly hurried; confused: They ran in a mad, helter-skelter fashion for the exits.
4. disorderly; haphazard: Books and papers were scattered on the desk in a helter-skelter manner.
–noun 5. tumultuous disorder; confusion.
[Origin: 1585–95; rhyming compound, perh. based on *skelt, ME skelten to hasten (< ?); redupl. with initial h parallel to hubble-bubble, higgledy-piggledy, etc.]
Not sure who is right about the origin. Isn't English great. Even the experts can't agree on a lot of it.
2007-09-20 11:56:34 · answer #1 · answered by ghouly05 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Long before the Beatles or Manson were born, fairgrounds had spiral slides called Helter-Skelters. The word means madly going off in all directions.
2007-09-20 04:22:28 · answer #2 · answered by picador 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The murders perpetrated by Charles Manson and members of his Family were inspired in part by Manson's prediction of Helter Skelter, an apocalyptic war he believed would arise from tension over racial relations between blacks and whites.[1] This "chimerical vision," as it was termed by the court that heard Manson's appeal from his conviction for the Tate-LaBianca killings,[2] involved reference to music of The Beatles and to the New Testament's Book of Revelation.
2007-09-20 03:02:58 · answer #3 · answered by Third_Eye_Dude 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
that's a rhyming reduplication (that's to assert the words on their very own have not have been given any meaning and are in basic terms proper by way of their pairing) and has meant "in chaotic and disorderly haste" in view that a minimum of the sixteenth century. 1592 seems to be the 1st use of the term in a literary artwork.
2016-11-05 22:47:48 · answer #4 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I don't believe it is a real word. I think it comes from the Beatles song and became part our vocabulary when it was written on the wall in blood when the Manson family killed the La Bianca couple.
2007-09-20 02:53:34 · answer #5 · answered by Busybake 3 · 0⤊ 2⤋
It's a fairly old English expression meaning 'confused', hence the look on someone's face when they get to the bottom of one and fall off their mat!
2007-09-20 05:29:37 · answer #6 · answered by derfini 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋