Humpty Dumpty
17
3.5
- proper noun
- /ˈhʌmpti ˈdʌmpti/
- Literature
- Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.
- Humpty Dumpty sat
- put Humpty Dumpty together again
- put Humpty Dumpty
Examples
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Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
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Like Humpty Dumpty, he can't get up.
Fiction book (1992) -
Good luck on Humpty Dumpty Day!
Blog text (33) -
Best of luck to you on this Humpty Dumpty Day, and thank you so much for sharing your story.
Blog text (33) -
So this is Humpty Dumpty in case you don't recognize him.
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Happy Humpty Dumpty Day!
Blog text (33) -
Happy Humpty Dumpty Day.
Blog text (33) -
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall before his great fall.
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In the famous nursery rhyme, Humpty Dumpty experiences a great fall.
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Everyone knows the story of Humpty Dumpty and how he fell from the wall.
Surface Forms
Morphology
Humpty + Dumpty
Humpty Dumpty is a proper name composed of non-lexical elements whose literal parts carry no predictable meaning; the character and the image (an egg who falls from a wall) are cultural/encyclopedic knowledge rather than a compositional inference from the constituents. A B1 learner who knows the constituent forms would not be able to derive the nursery-rhyme character or its backstory without prior exposure, so the expression is idiomatic and name-based rather than transparent.
Etymology
Humpty Dumpty is the egg-shaped figure from the old rhyme who falls off a wall and cannot be repaired. Because people imagine an egg shattering, the name is often used for things or people that are badly broken or that 'cannot be put back together'.