Definition of rattle

• v. i. - To make a quick succession of sharp, inharmonious noises, as by the collision of hard and not very sonorous bodies shaken together; to clatter.
• v. i. - To drive or ride briskly, so as to make a clattering; as, we rattled along for a couple of miles.
• v. i. - To make a clatter with the voice; to talk rapidly and idly; to clatter; -- with on or away; as, she rattled on for an hour.
• v. t. - To cause to make a rattling or clattering sound; as, to rattle a chain.
• v. t. - To assail, annoy, or stun with a rattling noise.
• v. t. - Hence, to disconcert; to confuse; as, to rattle one's judgment; to rattle a player in a game.
• v. t. - To scold; to rail at.
• n. - A rapid succession of sharp, clattering sounds; as, the rattle of a drum.
• n. - Noisy, rapid talk.
• n. - An instrument with which a rattling sound is made; especially, a child's toy that rattles when shaken.
• n. - A noisy, senseless talker; a jabberer.
• n. - A scolding; a sharp rebuke.
• n. - Any organ of an animal having a structure adapted to produce a rattling sound.
• n. - The noise in the throat produced by the air in passing through mucus which the lungs are unable to expel; -- chiefly observable at the approach of death, when it is called the death rattle. See R/le.