Word.ws English Dictionary

afterling

afterling noun: one who comes after or later; an aftercomer; one who is late.

Noun

afterling (plural afterlings)

  1. (rare) One who comes after or later; an aftercomer; one who is late.
    • Lange terms him "an afterling of the speculative Romanticism," and it seems clear that he is connected with the Hegelian Right and even with Schelling.1877, Nicholas Patrick Wiseman, The Dublin review
    • [...] of fair probability, or unclouded possibility, he is not, in fair judgment justly subject to abuse or censure by some afterling, building upon his work, who happens to discover documents which he believes are unknown to the Colonel.1922, Albert Alonzo Pomeroy, History and genealogy of the Pomeroy family

Adjective

afterling (comparative more afterling, superlative most afterling)

  1. (Scotland, rare) Coming after; later; subsequent; of later date; late in order of time or succession.
    • "That Heresie, whose afterling entry falling out in the dreg of all tymes doth render it suspect."1890, Notes and queries

Forms of afterling

Noun
pluralafterlings
Adjective
comparativemore afterling
superlativemost afterling

Origin of afterling

From Middle English afterling. Cognate with Scots afterling, efterling (“afterling”, adjective). By surface analysis, after + -ling.

Questions about afterling

What does afterling mean?
Afterling means one who comes after or later; an aftercomer; one who is late.
What part of speech is afterling?
Afterling can be a noun or an adjective.
What is the plural of afterling?
The plural of afterling is afterlings.

Words near afterling in the dictionary

  1. afterlife
  2. afterlifes
  3. afterlifetime
  4. afterlifetimes
  5. afterlight
  6. afterling
  7. afterlings
  8. afterlives
  9. afterload
  10. afterloading
  11. afterloads

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: afterling (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: “afterling.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/afterling. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.