different between jostle vs toss

English

Etymology

Originally justle (“to have sex with”), formed from Middle English jousten, from the Old French joster (“to joust”), from Latin iuxt? (“next to”), from iung? (“join, connect”), equivalent to joust +? -le.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?d??s.?l/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?d??.s?l/
• Rhymes: -?s?l

Verb

jostle (third-person singular simple present jostles, present participle jostling, simple past and past participle jostled)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To bump into or brush against while in motion; to push aside.
   • 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, London: J. Johnson, Part 1, Chapter 13, Section 3, pp. 434-435,^[1]

     Besides, various are the paths to power and fame which by accident or choice men pursue, and though they jostle against each other, for men of the same profession are seldom friends, yet there is a much greater number of their fellow-creatures with whom they never clash. But women are very differently situated with respect to each other—for they are all rivals.

   • 1832, Isaac Taylor, Saturday Evening, Chapter 12, p. 214,^[2]

     It is not that there are several systems of movement, physical, intellectual, and moral, which are perpetually jostling each other, or which clash whenever they come in contact, and which move on by the one vanquishing the other. But, on the contrary, each of these economies takes its uninterrupted course, as if there were no other moving within the same space […]

   • 1849, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans, Volume 1, Chapter 3, pp. 370-371,^[3]

     […] when the lord of a Lincolnshire or Shropshire manor appeared in Fleet Street, he was as easily distinguished from the resident population as a Turk or a Lascar. […] Bullies jostled him into the kennel. Hackney coachmen splashed him from head to foot. […]
2. (intransitive) To move through by pushing and shoving.
   • 1920, F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise, Book One, Chapter 3,^[4]

     Axia and Amory, acquaintances of an hour, jostled behind a waiter to a table at a point of vantage; there they took seats and watched.

3. (transitive) To be close to or in physical contact with.
   • 1859, Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species, London: John Murray, Chapter 4, p. 114,^[5]

     […] the advantages of diversification of structure, with the accompanying differences of habit and constitution, determine that the inhabitants, which thus jostle each other most closely, shall, as a general rule, belong to what we call different genera and orders.

4. (intransitive) To contend or vie in order to acquire something.
   • 1819, Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor, in Tales of My Landlord, Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, Third Series, Volume 1, Chapter 1, p. 22,^[6]

     Dick, who, in serious earnest, was supposed to have considerable natural talents for his profession, and whose vain and sanguine disposition never permitted him to doubt for a moment of ultimate success, threw himself headlong into the crowd which jostled and struggled for notice and preferment.

   • 1917, Rudyard Kipling, “The Children,” poem accompanying the story “The Honours of War” in A Diversity of Creatures, London: Macmillan, pp. 129-130,^[7]

     […] Our statecraft, our learning

     Delivered them bound to the Pit and alive to the burning

     Whither they mirthfully hastened as jostling for honour.

5. (dated, slang) To pick or attempt to pick pockets.

Translations

See also

• justle
• joust

Noun

jostle (plural jostles)

1. The act of jostling someone or something; push, shove.
   • 1722, Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders, London: J. Cooke, 1765, p. 241,^[8]

     I had full hold of her Watch, but giving a great Jostle, as if somebody had thrust me against her, and in the Juncture giving the Watch a fair pull, I found it would not come, so I let it go that Moment, and cried out as if I had been killed, that somebody had trod upon my Foot […]

2. The action of a jostling crowd.
   • 1865, Harriet Beecher Stowe (under the pseudonym Christopher Crowfield), The Chimney-Corner, Boston: Ticknor & Field, 1868, Chapter 12, p. 291,^[9]

     For years to come, the average of lone women will be largely increased; and the demand, always great, for some means by which they many provide for themselves, in the rude jostle of the world, will become more urgent and imperative.

Translations

English

Etymology

From Middle English tossen (“to buffet about, agitate, toss; to sift or winnow”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps from Old Norse (compare dialectal Norwegian tossa, dialectal Swedish tossa (“to strew, spread”)), or perhaps from an alteration of Middle English tosen (“to tease, pull apart, shred; to wound, injure”). Compare also Dutch tassen (“to pile or heap up, stack”).

The Welsh tos (“a quick jerk”) and tosio (“to jerk, toss”) are probably borrowed from the English.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /t?s/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /t?s/
• (cot–caught merger, Canada) IPA^(key): /t?s/
• Rhymes: -?s

Noun

toss (plural tosses)

1. A throw, a lob, of a ball etc., with an initial upward direction, particularly with a lack of care.
2. (cricket, soccer) The coin toss before a cricket match in order to decide who bats first, or before a football match in order to decide the direction of play.
3. A haughty throwing up of the head.
4. (British slang) A jot, in the phrase 'give a toss'.

   I couldn't give a toss about her.

5. (British slang) A state of agitation; commotion.
6. (Billingsgate Fish Market slang) A measure of sprats.

Derived terms

• argue the toss

Translations

Verb

toss (third-person singular simple present tosses, present participle tossing, simple past and past participle tossed or (obsolete) tost)

1. To throw with an initial upward direction.

2. To lift with a sudden or violent motion.

   • He tossed his arm aloft, and proudly told me, / He would not stay.

3. To agitate; to make restless.
4. To subject to trials; to harass.

   • Whom devils fly, thus is he tossed of men.

5. To flip a coin, to decide a point of contention.

6. (informal) To discard: to toss out

7. To stir or mix (a salad).

8. (British slang) To masturbate
9. (transitive, informal) To search (a room or a cell), sometimes leaving visible disorder, as for valuables or evidence of a crime.
10. (intransitive) To roll and tumble; to be in violent commotion.

11. (intransitive) To be tossed, as a fleet on the ocean, or as a ship in heavy seas.
12. (obsolete) To keep in play; to tumble over.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Ascham to this entry?)

13. (rowing) To peak (the oars), to lift them from the rowlocks and hold them perpendicularly, the handle resting on the bottom of the boat.
14. (British slang) To drink in large draughts; to gulp.

Derived terms

• toss one's cookies
• tosser
• toss off
• tosspot
• toss in
• toss up
• toss and turn
• tosticated

Translations

Anagrams

• OSTs, SSTO, osts, sots