Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Quibble

Quib′ble, n. [Probably fr. quib, quip, but influenced by quillet, or quiddity.] 1. A shift or turn from the point in question; a trifling or evasive distinction; an evasion; a cavil.

Quibbles have no place in the search after truth. I. Watts.

2. A pun; a low conceit.

Quib′ble, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Quibbled; p. pr. & vb. n. Quibbling.] 1. To evade the point in question by artifice, play upon words, caviling, or by raising any insignificant or impertinent question or point; to trifle in argument or discourse; to equivocate.

2. To pun; to practice punning. Cudworth.

Syn. — To cavil; shuffle; equivocate; trifle.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty.