Word.ws English Dictionary

embellishing

embellishing is the present participle and gerund of embellish.

Meaning of embellish

Verb

embellish (third-person singular simple present embellishes, present participle embellishing, simple past and past participle embellished)

  1. To make more beautiful and attractive by adding ornamentation; to decorate.
    • The old book cover was embellished with golden letters
  2. (broadly) To enhance by adding something not strictly integral or necessary.
    • A Scythian Shepherd, so imbelliſhed
      With Natures pride, and richeſt furniture?
      His looks do menace heauen & dare the Gods,
      His fiery eies are fixt vpon the earth.c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC...
  3. To make something sound or look better or more acceptable than it is in reality; to distort, embroider, or even misrepresent or lie.
    • to embellish a story, the truth

Noun

embellishing (plural embellishings)

  1. An embellishment.
    • His many embellishings of the tale stretched the credulity of the listeners.

Forms of embellishing

pluralembellishings

Questions about embellishing

What does embellishing mean?
Embellishing means an embellishment.
What is embellishing the present participle and gerund of?
Embellishing is the present participle and gerund of embellish.
What part of speech is embellishing?
Embellishing is a noun.
What is the plural of embellishing?
The plural of embellishing is embellishings.

Words near embellishing in the dictionary

  1. embellishable
  2. embellished
  3. embellisher
  4. embellishers
  5. embellishes
  6. embellishing
  7. embellishingly
  8. embellishings
  9. embellishment
  10. embellishments
  11. embellisht

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: embellishing (page history and authors); embellish (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: “embellishing.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/embellishing. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.