flense
/ˈflɛns/
flense verb: to strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc.
Verb
flense (third-person singular simple present flenses, present participle flensing, simple past and past participle flensed)
- To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc.
- In this domain right sex is capital, it flenses the feelings of all the poisonous artifices brought in by the think-box in the guise of clever ideas.1974, Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 198
- His eyes sprang open. Umegat stared straight at him for the fraction of a second, and Cazaril felt flensed.2001, Lois McMaster Bujold, The Curse of Chalion, →ISBN, page 191
Examples of flense in a sentence
- It engulfed screaming soldiers who disappeared before his eyes, their flesh, armor, even bone, flensed into a suspended mist that was heading straight for them.2008, Ian C. Esselemont, Return of the Crimson Guard, →ISBN, page 569:
- If they defeated potential invaders the New Irish hanged the vanquished from banyan trees, flensed their windpipes, removed their heads, left their intestines to jerk in the sun.2011, Dominic Smith, Bright and Distant Shores, page 106:
Synonyms of flense
Forms of flense
| third-person singular present | flenses |
|---|---|
| present participle | flensing |
| past participle | flensed |
| past | flensed |
| alternative form | flench |
| alternative form | flinch |
Origin of flense
Borrowed from Danish flense (now spelled flænse).
Words that rhyme with flense
Questions about flense
- What does flense mean?
- Flense means to strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc.
- How do you use flense in a sentence?
- It engulfed screaming soldiers who disappeared before his eyes, their flesh, armor, even bone, flensed into a suspended mist that was heading straight for them.
- What part of speech is flense?
- Flense is a verb.
- How do you pronounce flense?
- Flense is pronounced /ˈflɛns/.
- What is the past tense of flense?
- The past tense of flense is flensed.
Words near flense in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: flense (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-flense.wav.
Cite this entry: “flense.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/flense. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.