Word.ws English Dictionary

abridging

/əˈbɹɪd͡ʒɪŋ/

abridging is the present participle and gerund of abridge.

Meaning of abridge

Verb

abridge (third-person singular simple present abridges, present participle abridging, simple past and past participle abridged)

  1. (archaic, transitive) To deprive; to cut off.
  2. (archaic, rare, transitive) To debar from.
  3. (transitive) To make shorter; to shorten in duration or extent.
    • She retired her self to Sebaste, and abridged her train from State to necessity.1639, Thomas Fuller, The Historie of the Holy Warre, Cambridge, Book 2, Chapter 31, p. 85
  4. (transitive) To shorten or contract by using fewer words, yet retaining the sense; to epitomize; to condense.
    • It was still necessary for the man who had been formerly saluted by the highest authority as dictator of the English language to supply his wants by constant toil. He abridged his Dictionary. He proposed to bring out an edition of Shakespeare by subscription, and many subscribers sent in their...1911, Samuel Johnson, 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica
  5. (transitive) Cut short; truncate.
  6. (transitive) To curtail.
    • He had his rights abridged by the crooked sheriff.

See all 7 meanings of abridge

Noun

abridging (plural abridgings)

  1. An abridgment.

Forms of abridging

pluralabridgings

Questions about abridging

What does abridging mean?
Abridging means an abridgment.
What is abridging the present participle and gerund of?
Abridging is the present participle and gerund of abridge.
What part of speech is abridging?
Abridging is a noun.
How do you pronounce abridging?
Abridging is pronounced /əˈbɹɪd͡ʒɪŋ/.
What is the plural of abridging?
The plural of abridging is abridgings.

Words near abridging in the dictionary

  1. abridgement
  2. abridgements
  3. abridger
  4. abridgers
  5. abridges
  6. abridging
  7. abridgings
  8. abridgment
  9. abridgments
  10. Abrielle
  11. Abrigo

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: abridging (page history and authors); abridge (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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Cite this entry: “abridging.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/abridging. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.