The Only Use of
shambles
in
Othello, the Moor of Venice
- O, ay; as summer flies are in the shambles, That quicken even with blowing.†
Scene 4.2
Definitions:
-
(1)
(shambles as in: the place is a shambles) a condition of great disorder
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
In the past, shambles referenced a slaughterhouse (a building used to butcher animals) -- as when Joseph Conrad wrote in The Secret Agent, "I told him that I dreamt of a world like shambles, where the weak would be taken in hand for utter extermination."
Very rarely, shambles is used as a form of the verb shamble to indicate a type of awkward shuffling walk, as in "She shambles when she is nervous."