What does cartwheeled mean?
Cartwheeled is the past tense of the verb cartwheel, which has two related senses. In its most familiar use, it describes someone performing a cartwheel: an acrobatic manoeuvre in which the body turns sideways through the hands and feet in a full revolution, like the spoke of a turning wheel. Children cartwheel across lawns and gym floors, and the word carries a light, playful connotation in this context. The verb also describes violent motion: a car, lorry, or aircraft that loses control may be said to have cartwheeled, spinning end over end until it comes to rest. This second sense appears often in journalistic accounts of accidents and lends a dramatic, kinetic force to descriptions. The word is a straightforward compound of cart and wheel, evoking the rotation of a wheel on an old-fashioned cart. It works equally well in literal description and vivid figurative narration, making it a useful verb whenever something — or someone — turns head over heels.
verbPast tense and past participle of "cartwheel": to perform a sideways acrobatic movement in which the body turns over through the hands like a wheel, or (of a vehicle or object) to turn over or spin wildly, end over end.
- (of a person) performed a cartwheel — an acrobatic sideways hands-over-feet revolution of the body
- (of a vehicle or object) turned over or spun wildly end over end, typically in an accident
"The children cartwheeled across the sunlit lawn all afternoon."
"She cartwheeled across the gymnasium floor with perfect form."
"The lorry skidded on the ice, cartwheeled down the embankment, and came to rest upside down."
When your car 'cartwheels' down a motorway it's the same word as when a gymnast does one — English borrowed the humble farm cart's wheel for both.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of cartwheeled
The verb derives from the noun cartwheel, a compound of cart and wheel recorded in English from the Middle Ages in its literal sense of the wheel of a cart. Because a turning cartwheel suggested the rotating motion of the acrobatic move, the noun came to name the gymnastic feat, and from there it developed verbal use — first attested around the early twentieth century — meaning both to perform such a move and to spin over like a wheel. The element wheel traces back to Old English hweol, from the Proto-Indo-European root *kwel-, meaning to revolve, which also yields Greek-derived relatives such as cycle, cyclone, and encyclopedia, and Sanskrit cakra (chakra).
Related word forms
How cartwheeled is actually used
The literal gymnastic sense is neutral and common in everyday and sporting contexts; the sense describing vehicles or objects spinning over is frequent in news reporting of accidents and can carry a dramatic or alarming connotation. Both senses are standard in British and American English.
Easily confused with cartwheeled
"Caterwauled" means made a shrill howling or wailing noise (like a cat), while "cartwheeled" means performed an acrobatic wheel-like turn or spun over violently.