Skirmish vs Bicker - What's the difference?
skirmish | bicker |
(military) A brief battle between small groups, usually part of a longer or larger battle or war.
(figuratively) By extension, any minor dispute.
A type of outdoor military style game using paintball or similar weapons.
To engage in a minor battle or dispute
To quarrel in a tiresome, insulting manner.
* Barrow
To move tremulously, quiver, shimmer (of a water stream, of a flame)
*XIX cent,
* Thomson
To skirmish; to exchange blows; to fight.
* Holland
A skirmish; an encounter.
(Scotland, obsolete) A fight with stones between two parties of boys.
A wrangle; also, a noise, as in angry contention.
As nouns the difference between skirmish and bicker
is that skirmish is a brief battle between small groups, usually part of a longer or larger battle or war while bicker is a skirmish; an encounter.As verbs the difference between skirmish and bicker
is that skirmish is to engage in a minor battle or dispute while bicker is to quarrel in a tiresome, insulting manner.skirmish
English
Noun
(es)Synonyms
* See also * See alsoVerb
(es)bicker
English
Etymology 1
(etyl) bikeren ‘to attack’, from (etyl) bicken ‘to stab, attack’ (modern bikken ‘to hack’), from (etyl) ‘to smash, break’.Verb
(en verb)- They bickered about dinner every evening.
- petty things about which men cark and bicker
- I come from haunts of coot and hern, / I make a sudden sally, / And sparkle out among the fern, / To bicker down a valley.
- They [streamlets] bickered through the sunny shade.
- Two eagles had a conflict, and bickered together.
Derived terms
*bickererSynonyms
* wrangle * See alsoNoun
(en noun)- (Jamieson)