aflutter

adj

Etymology: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Indo-European *n̥- Proto-Hellenic *ə- Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-)der. English a- English flutter- English aflutter From a- + flutter-.

1. Fluttering.

   “I can hear / Your heart a-flutter over the snow-hills;”

   “1888, W. B. Yeats, “King Gall” in uncredited editor, Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland, Dublin: M.H. Gill, p. 43, They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me—the beech leaves old”

2. Filled or covered (with something that flutters).

   “The day being warm and sultry, the balcony was all aflutter with the feather fans of the ladies of the family and their attendants,”

   “Beyond this lie the gardens of Hafiz and Saadi, each containing the poet’s tomb, and many others equally delicious for their cypresses, pines, and orange trees a-flutter with white pigeons and orchestras of sparrows.”

3. In a state of tremulous excitement, anticipation or confusion.

   “[…] she rose, all a-flutter within, it is true, but with a face as nearly sedate as the inborn witchery of her eyes would allow.”

   “1930, Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, Once in a Lifetime, Act III, in Burns Mantle (ed.), The Best Plays of 1930-31, New York: Dodd, Mead, 1931, p. 144, […] in breaks Susan Walker a little more aflutter than usual. The picture is wonderful. Seeing her name in lights is wonderful. Everything is just wonderful.”