Word.ws English Dictionary

cabbeling

Syllables: cab·bel·ing/kəˈbɛlɪŋ/

cabbeling noun: the process by which two masses of water with different temperatures and salinities mix to form a new water mass with a density higher than the density of either parent water mass; also, the sinking of the new water mass as the effect of its increased density.

cabbeling: the process by which two masses of water with different temperatures and salinities mix to form a...
Image: NASA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

cabbeling (uncountable)

  1. The process by which two masses of water with different temperatures and salinities mix to form a new water mass with a density higher than the density of either parent water mass; also, the sinking of the new water mass as the effect of its increased density.
    • He reasoned that cabbeling would form a front at the juxtaposition of Warm Deep Water and Shelf Water. Sinking along such a front would thus inhibit the cross shelf flow of shelf water.1934, Thomas North Whitehead, The Design and Use of Instruments and Accurate Mechanisms: Underlying Principles, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan Co., →OCLC, page 684
    • To complete this catalog of thermodynamic processes of importance in shallow seas, the phenomenon of cabbeling should be mentioned (from the German ‘Kabbelung’, see Horne et al. (1978), usually pronoun[c]ed in English with the emphasis on the second syllable). Because the equation of state of water...1982, G. T. Csanady, Circulation in the Coastal Ocean (Environmental Fluid Mechanics; 2), Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands, →ISBN, page 212

Examples of cabbeling in a sentence

  • Sinking motion so generated is referred to as ‘cabbeling’.1982, G. T. Csanady, Circulation in the Coastal Ocean (Environmental Fluid Mechanics; 2), Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands, →ISBN, page 212:
  • This process, called cabbeling in oceanography, is due to the nonlinearity of the equation of state of seawater, especially the increase of the thermal expansion coefficient with temperature.2010, Rui Xin Huang, Ocean Circulation: Wind-Driven and Thermohaline Processes, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 100:

Forms of cabbeling

alternative formcaballing
alternative formcabbelling

Origin of cabbeling

From German Kabbelung; according to Foster (1972), the German word was first applied to the phenomenon by Witte (1902), and subsequently used in an anglicized form by Stommel (1960) and others.

Words that rhyme with cabbeling

1 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cabbeling

What does cabbeling mean?
Cabbeling means the process by which two masses of water with different temperatures and salinities mix to form a new water mass with a density higher than the density of either parent water mass; also, the sinking of the new water mass as the effect of its increased density.
How do you use cabbeling in a sentence?
Sinking motion so generated is referred to as ‘cabbeling’.
What part of speech is cabbeling?
Cabbeling is a noun.
How do you pronounce cabbeling?
Cabbeling is pronounced /kəˈbɛlɪŋ/ (UK).

Words near cabbeling in the dictionary

  1. cabbalize
  2. cabbalized
  3. cabbalizes
  4. cabbalizing
  5. cabbed
  6. cabbeling
  7. Cabbeljaw
  8. Cabbeljaws
  9. cabbelling
  10. cabber
  11. cabbers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cabbeling (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-cabbeling.wav.

Cite this entry: “cabbeling.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cabbeling. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.