A small four-sided disk or die having an initial letter inscribed on
each of its sides, and a spindle passing down through it by which it
could be twirled or spun with the fingers like a small top, the letter
which lay uppermost, when it fell, deciding the fortune of the player;
now, any light top (sometimes a circular disk pierced by a short peg),
spun with the fingers, used as a toy.The letters were originally the initials of Latin words, viz. T totum, A aufer, D depone, N nihil. Subsequently they were the initials of English words, T being interpreted as take-all: see quot. 1801. On the French totum or toton, the letters are T, A, D, R, meaning, according to Littré, Totum, tout, Accipe, prends, Da, donne, Rien (nothing).
1720 D. Defoe Life D. Campbell
(1841)
50
A very fine ivory T totum, as children call it.
1778 F. Burney Evelina III. xxi. 240
And turn round like a tetotum.
1800 Sporting Mag. 15 48
A man was lately convicted..for selling a teetotum.
1801 J. Strutt Glig-gamena Angel-ðeod iv. iv. 341
When I was a boy the te-totum had only four sides, each of them
marked with a letter; a T for take all; an H for half, that is, of the
stake; an N for nothing; and a P for put down, that is, a stake equal to
that you put down at first.
1818 T. Moore Fudge Family in Paris v. 23
Though, like a tee~totum, I'm all in a twirl, Yet even (as you
wittily say) a tee~totum Between all its twirls gives a letter to note
'em.
1893 W. S. Gilbert Utopia (Limited) 11,
She'll waltz away like a teetotum.
