treble

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɹɛbəl/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛbəl

From Middle English treble, from Old French treble, from Latin triplus. Doublet of triple.

treble (not comparable)

1. High in pitch.

   Synonyms: high-pitched, strident

   Antonym: bass

   • 1957, J[erome] D[avid] Salinger, “Zooey”, in Franny and Zooey, published 1961:

     He put his cigar in his mouth, and, with his right hand, up in the treble keys, he began to play, in octaves, the melody of a song called "The Kinkajou," which, somewhat notably, had shifted into and ostensibly out of popularity before he was born.

2. (music) Pertaining to the highest singing voice or part in harmonized music; soprano.
3. (dated) Threefold, triple.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:triple

   • 1697, John Dryden, chapter 6, in The Aeneid by Virgil:

     A lofty tower, and strong on every side / With treble walls.

   • 1806, The Orthodox Churchman’s Magazine and Review; or, A Treasury of Divine and Useful Knowledge, volume X, London: […] J. G. Barnard, […], and sold by F[rancis,] C[harles] and J[ohn] Rivington, […], page 140:

     Every subscriber of one penny per week, who is sixty years of age, or upwards, and under four-score, to be entitled to receive treble his subscription at the end of the year; that is, his own subscription, and twice as much more.

   • 1837 Penny Cyclopedia, vol. 7, s.v. "Constantinople":

     The treble walls and ditches on the land side [...] diminish the extent of ground covered with houses.

treble (not comparable)

1. (dated) Trebly; triply.

   Synonyms: thrice, threefold; see also Thesaurus:thrice

   • 1623 (first performance), John Fletcher, William Rowley, “The Maid in the Mill”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):

     Whose deserts might buy him treble

treble (plural trebles)

1. (music) The highest singing voice (especially as for a boy) or part in musical composition.
   • 1959, The Musical quarterly - Volume 45, page xlvi:

     He starts out by saying that there are three sights, the mene, treble, and quadreble, but actually he discusses only two, the treble and quadreble, both of which are read at the transposition of an octave.

   • 1991, Blanche Gangwere, Music history during the Renaissance period, 1425-1520, page 25:

     The voices include a counter (always below the tenor), a countertenor (moving above and below the tenor), mene, treble, and quadreble.

   • 2003, Willi Apel, Don Michael Randel, The Harvard Dictionary of Music, page 780:

     The counter involves transposition of the sighted note to the fifth below (for extremely low notes a twelfth), the mene and countertenor do not transpose, the treble transposes to the octave above, and the quadreble to the twelfth above.

2. (music) A person or instrument having a treble voice or pitch; a boy soprano.
3. The highest tuned in a ring of bells.
4. Any high-pitched or shrill voice or sound.
5. (dated) A threefold quantity or number; something having three parts or having been tripled.
6. (dated) A drink with three portions of alcohol; a triple
7. (darts) Any of the narrow areas enclosed by the two central circles on a dartboard, worth three times the usual value of the segment.
8. (sports) Three goals, victories, awards etc. in a given match or season.
   • 2014 March 9, Jacob Steinberg, “Wigan shock Manchester City in FA Cup again to reach semi-finals”, in The Guardian:

     As for City, a domestic treble is off the cards and they must haul themselves off the floor quickly with the second leg of their last-16 Champions League tie against Barcelona on Wednesday.

treble (third-person singular simple present trebles, present participle trebling, simple past and past participle trebled)

1. (transitive, dated) To multiply by three; to make into three parts, layers, or thrice the amount.

   Synonyms: triple; see also Thesaurus:treble

   • 2022 January 11, Kate Connolly, “German climate minister says speed of carbon cuts needs to be trebled”, in The Guardian‎:

     German climate minister says speed of carbon cuts needs to be trebled [title]

2. (intransitive, dated) To become multiplied by three or increased threefold.
3. (intransitive) To make a shrill or high-pitched noise.

   Synonyms: keen, screech, shrill

4. (transitive) To utter in a treble key; to whine.
   • 1618, George Chapman, A Hymn to Hermes:

     He outrageously / (When I accused him) trebled his reply.

treble (plural trebles)

1. Alternative form of tribble (“frame for drying paper”)

• Belter, Beltre, Elbert, Lebert, belter

From Latin triplus.

treble m (oblique and nominative feminine singular treble)

1. treble; triple
   • 1314, H. de Mondeville, Chirurgie, page 24, 3rd column, lines 9-12:

     L'utilité […] est treble

     The usefulness […] is treble

• → Middle English: treble
  • English: treble

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l’ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (treble)