Word.ws English Dictionary

abashing

abashing adjective: tending to abash; causing embarrassment or the loss of self-possession. Also the present participle and gerund of abash.

Adjective

abashing (comparative more abashing, superlative most abashing)

  1. Tending to abash; causing embarrassment or the loss of self-possession.
    • […] many young People have by the grace of the Lord been prepared for full Communion, and have taken hold of the Covenant, confessing, that they have felt the impression of that Word upon that abashing occasion spoken:1684, Increase Mather, chapter 12, in An Essay for the Recording of Illustrious Providences, Boston: Joseph Browning, pages 366–367
    • Why these fair girls are so stared at by the men, and the young fellows, now-a-days, have a damn’d impudent stare with them,—’tis very abashing to a woman—very distressing!1784, Hannah Cowley, A Bold Stroke for a Husband, London: T. Evans, act III, scene 3, pages 47–48

Also used as

abashing is also the present participle and gerund of abash.

Examples of abashing in a sentence

  • Before Angus appeared, Martin had to wait a quarter-hour in a smaller, richer, still more abashing reception-room.1925, Sinclair Lewis, chapter 24, in Arrowsmith, New York: Grosset & Dunlap, page 265:
  • But when the roaring died, there was only the silence: the awful, abashing stillness of the prison night.2006, Sarah Waters, chapter 3, in The Night Watch, London: Virago, published 1944, page 287:

Synonyms of abashing

Forms of abashing

comparativemore abashing
superlativemost abashing

Words formed from abashing

Questions about abashing

What does abashing mean?
Abashing means tending to abash; causing embarrassment or the loss of self-possession.
How do you use abashing in a sentence?
Before Angus appeared, Martin had to wait a quarter-hour in a smaller, richer, still more abashing reception-room.
What part of speech is abashing?
Abashing is an adjective.

Words near abashing in the dictionary

  1. abashedness
  2. abashes
  3. abashest
  4. abasheth
  5. Abashev
  6. abashing
  7. abashingly
  8. abashless
  9. abashlessly
  10. abashment
  11. abashments

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: abashing (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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