cudgel
/ˈkʌd͡ʒəl/
cudgel noun: a short heavy club with a rounded head used as a weapon.
Noun
cudgel (plural cudgels)
- A short heavy club with a rounded head used as a weapon.
- The guard hefted his cudgel menacingly and looked at the inmates.
- Then they had bouts of wrestling and of cudgel play, so that every day they gained in skill and strength.1883, Howard Pyle, “Robin Hood Turns Butcher”, in The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood […], New York, N.Y.: […] Charles Scribner’s Sons […], →OCLC, part second, page 48
- Anything that can be used as a threat to force one's will on another.
- As above said, legibility depends also much on the design of the letter; and again I take up the cudgels against compressed type, and that especially in Roman letters: […]1893, William Morris, The Ideal Book, published 1908
- Mrs. Clinton’s Senate tenure, however, also demonstrated the risks of overcompensation: Not wanting to give Republicans fodder to portray her as soft on defense, she authorized President Bush to use force in Iraq and handed Mr. Obama a political cudgel to use against her.2015 April 15, Jonathan Martin, “For a Clinton, It’s Not Hard to Be Humble in an Effort to Regain Power”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 08 Nov 2020
Verb
cudgel (third-person singular simple present cudgels, present participle (US) cudgeling or (UK) cudgelling, simple past and past participle (US) cudgeled or (UK) cudgelled)
- To strike with a cudgel.
- The officer was violently cudgeled down in the midst of the rioters.
- I would cudgel him like a dog if he would say so.c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- To exercise (one's wits or brains) in an effort to force a memory or solution; to rack (one's mind).
- “Most remarkable,” murmured Tarzan, cudgeling his brain for some pretext upon which to turn the subject.1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 102
Proper noun capitalized: Cudgel
Cudgel
- A locality in the Leeton council area, southern New South Wales, Australia.
cudgel meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada
cudgel in Hindi
- cudgel
- लट्ठ laṭṭh, पटा paṭā
- cudgel, staff, stick; lathi
- लाठी lāṭhī
cudgel in Urdu
- ڈنڈا, لاٹھی, لٹھ, کندی کرنا, پٹائی کرنا
cudgel in Malayalam
- ഗദ, വളഞ്ഞ വടി, ദണ്ഡ്, കുറുവടി
cudgel in Kannada
- ತಡಿ, ದೊಣ್ಣೆ, ಡೊಣ್ಣೆ, ಕುಣಿಲು, ಗುದಿಗೆ, ಬಡಿಕೋಲು
More languagesFewer languages
- cudgel in Odia
- ଲାଠି lāṭhi
- cudgel in Tagalog
- pambatikos
- cudgel in Persian
- گوپال gupâl, چماق čomâq
Examples of cudgel in a sentence
- So when he aroſe, he getteth him a grievous Crab-tree cudgel, and goes down into the Dungeon to them; and there firſt falls to Rateing of them, as if they were dogs: […]1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World, to That which is to Come: […], London: […] Nath[aniel] Ponder […], →OCLC, page...
- [Montana Senator Steve] Daines isn’t the only example of right-wing politicians who wish to wield anti-Semitism as a convenient cudgel against their political enemies, with scant if any evidence.2019 July 17, Talia Lavin, “When Non-Jews Wield Anti-Semitism as Political Shield”, in GQ, archived from the original on 13 Mar 2021:
- Cruz has been able to use his pseudo-intellectualism and his Ivy League pedigree as a cudgel.2021 January 11, Mimi Swartz, “Never Forget What Ted Cruz Did”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 08 Mar 2021:
- Poets like Cudgel'd Bullys, never do / At firſt, or ſecond blow, ſubmit to you; / But will provoke you ſtill and ne're have done, / Till you are weary ſirst, with laying on: […]1675, [William] Wycherley, The Country-wife, a Comedy, […], London: Printed for Thomas Dring, […], →OCLC; republished London: Printed for...
Forms of cudgel
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | cudgels |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | cudgels |
| present participle US | cudgeling |
| present participle UK | cudgelling |
| past participle US | cudgeled |
| past US | cudgeled |
| past participle UK | cudgelled |
| past UK | cudgelled |
Origin of cudgel
From Middle English kuggel, from Old English cyċġel (“a large stick, cudgel”), from Proto-West Germanic *kuggil, from Proto-Germanic *kuggilaz (“a knobbed instrument”), derivative of Proto-Germanic *kuggǭ (“cog, swelling”), from Proto-Indo-European *gewgʰ- (“swelling, bow”), from Proto-Indo-European *gew- (“to bow, bend, arch, curve”), equivalent to cog + -el (diminutive suffix). Cognate with Middle Dutch coghele (“a stick with a rounded end”).
Words formed from cudgel
Phrases with cudgel
Questions about cudgel
- What does cudgel mean?
- Cudgel means a short heavy club with a rounded head used as a weapon.
- What is cudgel in Hindi?
- Cudgel in Hindi is लट्ठ (laṭṭh), पटा (paṭā), लाठी (lāṭhī). See Cudgel meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use cudgel in a sentence?
- So when he aroſe, he getteth him a grievous Crab-tree cudgel, and goes down into the Dungeon to them; and there firſt falls to Rateing of them, as if they were dogs: […]
- What part of speech is cudgel?
- Cudgel can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce cudgel?
- Cudgel is pronounced /ˈkʌd͡ʒəl/.
- What is the plural of cudgel?
- The plural of cudgel is cudgels.
Words near cudgel in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: cudgel (page history and authors); Cudgel (page history and authors); पटा (Hindi) (page history and authors); cudgel (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cudgel (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cudgel (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ଲାଠି (Odia) (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-cudgel.ogg.
Cite this entry: “cudgel.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cudgel. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.