Noun
The suspect was arrested after a tussle with a security guard.
a tussle for control of the company
The President is in for another tussle with Congress. Verb
Two players tussled for the ball.
The residents of the neighborhood tussled with city hall for years about the broken parking meters.
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Noun
Roaring and grunting, his body sleek with blood and sweat, Conan tussles and grapples with a series of opponents, dominating them all, while an audience of torch-wielding vulgarians shouts and howls at the pit’s lip.—Naomi Fry, New Yorker, 15 June 2026 That led to a behind-the-scenes tussle between OPD and federal authorities about what to release to the public and when.—Cristóbal Reyes, The Orlando Sentinel, 12 June 2026
Verb
But the Americans tussled right back, and never totally lost their cool.—Sean Gregory, Time, 20 June 2026 Bowser tussled with Trump for much of 2025 over deploying the National Guard and briefly taking over the city's police department while cooperating with the White House on other matters such as clearing homeless encampments.—Phillip M. Bailey, USA Today, 17 June 2026 See All Example Sentences for tussle
Word History
Etymology
Verb
Middle English (Scots) tussillen, frequentative of Middle English -tusen, -tousen to tousle — more at touse