My daughter is reading 'The Fifth of March - a story of the boston massacre' by Ann Rinaldi in her reading class - fifth grade.

There is a reference to the word 'dongled' in a sentence and I can't find an appropriate definition. I'm aware of the term as it is used in reference to computers - hardly the case in a revolutionary war timeframe.

So...... here's the sentence out of the book "Have the children settled down since being dongled awake by those tyrannical cannons?"

Any ideas -

Welcome aBoard, markw.

Although a "ding, dong' sound is used more generally for bells than cannons, my guess is that this word is a combination of dong and jangled.

maybe it is a nonce inflection of dong, meant to suggest a deep sound, as that of a large bell -- I'm thinking along the lines of the "1812 Overture" with bells and cannons.

I'd tend to agree with Jackie and tsuwm - dongled probably means woken up by a loud reverbrating noise - as from nearby church bells.

Shorter Oxford only has --

Dongle: [Computing] A software protection device which must be plugged into a computer to enable the protected software to be used on it --

which is no use at all in the context of the book!

Thanks everyone - the ringing of bells and the echo of cannons was what we were thinking!

I ran all my best sources (British and American) for a usage of the verb "to dongle" as you found it in your child's text ... without success. In the process, I learned a great deal about dongles -- devices which attach to a data port on a PC to limit access to a particular application, as part of a security package.