Word.ws English Dictionary

biding one's time

biding one's time is the present participle and gerund of bide one's time.

Meaning of bide one's time

Verb

bide one's time (third-person singular simple present bides one's time, present participle biding one's time, simple past bode one's time or bided one's time, past participle bidden one's time or bided one's time)

  1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To wait, especially for a suitable opportunity.
    • Ravenswood, who had assumed the disguise of a sewer upon the occasion, answered, in a stern voice, “I bide my time”; and at the same moment a bull’s head, the ancient symbol of death, was placed upon the table.1819, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter III, in Tales of My Landlord, Third Series. […], volume I (The Bride of Lammermoor), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for...

Questions about biding one's time

What is biding one's time the present participle and gerund of?
Biding one's time is the present participle and gerund of bide one's time.

Words near biding one's time in the dictionary

  1. bidimensional
  2. bidimensionality
  3. bidimensionally
  4. bidiminished
  5. biding
  6. biding one's time
  7. biding tryst
  8. bidings
  9. bidirected
  10. bidirectional
  11. bidirectionalities

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: biding one's time (page history and authors); bide one's time (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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