Crabble

Part of speech: verb, noun

Definitions

1. To move along clumsily on hands and knees or in a sideways scramble, much as a crab moves across sand
2. Describing the act of crawling or scuttling along in an awkward, sprawling manner close to the ground
3. Travelling in a laborious, sideways crawl, the way a crab or a person struggling over rough ground might

Etymology: "Crabble" is a simple case: it is "crab" with the frequentative suffix "-le", the same ending found in words like "dazzle" and "twinkle", which signals repeated or fumbling motion. The sense of crabbling is therefore of crawling in a repeated, scrabbling way, with the limbs working over and over rather than moving in one smooth stride. The more surprising link is with "crawl". The two words are doublets, meaning they descend from the same ancient root but reached English by different routes. Both were formed in the same manner in Proto-Germanic times, each adding a frequentative element to a shared base, so "crabble" and "crawl" are close cousins rather than one borrowed from the other. The same形 pattern appears across the Germanic languages. Dutch "krabbelen" and German "krabbeln" share the sense of scrambling or clambering with small, busy movements, and Saterland Frisian "krabbelje" points to the same family of forms.