double Dutch
noun/dʌb.əl ˈdʌtʃ/
Etymology From double (“twice, i.e. more than”) + Dutch. For sense 1: Dutch (which historically had a wider meaning) as a foreign language was not easily understood, so anything completely incomprehensible would be double Dutch, i.e. twice as hard as Dutch. Sense 2 expands on this meaning.
1
Incomprehensible language or speech.
- “Tell him I don’t know what he’s talking about. It’s double Dutch to me.”1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 121:
2
A language game akin to pig Latin.
3
A game of jump rope with two ropes and frequently two jumpers.
4
Colloquial Sex using a condom and the contraceptive pill at the same time.
- Synonyms
- all Greek to me, gibberish, gobbledygook, nonsense