Definition of riddle

• n. - A sieve with coarse meshes, usually of wire, for separating coarser materials from finer, as chaff from grain, cinders from ashes, or gravel from sand.
• n. - A board having a row of pins, set zigzag, between which wire is drawn to straighten it.
• v. t. - To separate, as grain from the chaff, with a riddle; to pass through a riddle; as, riddle wheat; to riddle coal or gravel.
• v. t. - To perforate so as to make like a riddle; to make many holes in; as, a house riddled with shot.
• n. - Something proposed to be solved by guessing or conjecture; a puzzling question; an ambiguous proposition; an enigma; hence, anything ambiguous or puzzling.
• v. t. - To explain; to solve; to unriddle.
• v. i. - To speak ambiguously or enigmatically.