Dictionary

rutch en · VERB

Pronunciation

• /ɹʊt͡ʃ/

Etymology

Partly from German rutschen (“slide”), partly (especially in Pennsylvania Dutch English) from Pennsylvania German rutsche (“slide; move around frequently”), and partly (especially in Amish use) from Plautdietsch rutschen (“slide”). Compare also West Country English ruge (“slippery”).

Meanings

1. (US, archaic, in Yorkshire, informal) To slide; to scooch; to shuffle.
   • The twelfth had his chair half turned and was playing across a far corner of the table the board-game that made the occasional tiny rutching noises. 1964 January, Fritz Leiber, Harry [Otto] Fischer, “The Lords of Quarmall”, in Cele Goldsmith, editor, Fantastic: Stories of Imagination, volume 13, number 1, Chicago, Ill.: Ziff-Davis Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 9, column 1:
   • Then, having salaamed the diwan obsequiously, he walked to the nearest gate with the heels of his loose sandals rutching on the gravel and dislike of exercise written all over him as if he were a Hindu merchant to the manner born. 1923, Adventure, page 44:
   • Then Ismail set the pace yet faster, and they became the last two of a procession of turbaned men who tramped along a winding tunnel into a great mountain's womb. The sound of slippers clicking and rutching on the rock floor swelled and died and swelled again ... 1916, Talbot Mundy, King-of the Khyber rifles: a romance of adventure, page 201:
   • Oata […] rutches herself over the middle of the seat […] […] And I know for sure that I have a pink face because the stubble on my chin feels hot and Oata rutches her chair closer to me so she can pour the last wine from the catsup bottle into our glasses […] 1989, Hildi Froese Tiessen, Liars and Rascals: Mennonite Short Stories, pages 211 and 217:
   • "Ponsonby, my boy." The man in drab silk slipped into a chair next to Kirby's as a wolf slips into his lair, very circumspectly, and without noise; then he rutched the chair sidewise toward Kirby […] 2018, Talbot Mundy, Thirteen Books, B&R Samizdat Express, →ISBN:
2. (Dutch, English, Pennsylvania, especially) To squirm; to move around frequently.
   • Sitting on hard wooden chairs in school didn't help one bit, and I had an especially difficult time sitting still in class. One of my teachers was quite versed in Pennsylvania Dutch, and kept saying, “Quit your rutching!" 2010, Robert Struesel, He Said I Could: Extraordinary from the Ordinary, iUniverse, →ISBN:

Forms

Relateds

ruche · ruck · rootch