pell-mell

adverb

ˌpel-ˈmel

Synonyms of pell-mell

: in mingled confusion or disorder

papers strewn pell-mell on the desk

: in confused haste

ran pell-mell for the door

pell-mell adjective or noun

Did you know?

The word pell-mell was probably formed through a process called reduplication. This process—which involves the repetition of a word or part of a word, with often a slight change in its form—also generated the terms flip-flop, chitchat, and shilly-shally, the last of which comes from a single-word compression of the question “Shall I?” For pell-mell, the process is believed to have occurred long ago: our word traces to a Middle French word of the same meaning, pelemele, which comes from the Old French word pesle mesle, likely a product of reduplication from the Old French word mesle, a form of mesler, meaning “to mix” or “to mingle.”

Examples of pell-mell in a Sentence

tossed stuff pell-mell into the dorm room ran pell-mell down the road to get help

Recent Examples on the Web

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

People ran pell-mell outside, sped away in cars with no clear destination, went to church, or just phoned the police or radio station to hyperventilate. —Nicolas Rapold, airmail.news, 23 Nov. 2024 Abe and Mary are part Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara, part George and Martha, part the old vaudevillians George Burns and Gracie Allen, all running together pell-mell toward the Copacabana. —Chris Jones, New York Daily News, 12 July 2024