Word.ws English Dictionary

paltering

paltering is the present participle and gerund of palter.

Meaning of palter

Verb

palter (third-person singular simple present palters, present participle paltering, simple past and past participle paltered)

  1. To talk insincerely; to prevaricate or equivocate in speech or actions.
    • Romans, that have spoke the word,
      And will not palter.1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
    1. To give a false impression by selective use of true but misleading statements.
  2. (archaic) To trifle.
    • Palter out your time in the penal statutes.1625, John Fletcher, Philip Massinger, “The Elder Brother. A Comedy.”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1679, →OCLC, (please...
  3. To haggle.
    • Herceler. Voyez to haggle, to dodge. N.b. Cotgrave defines herceler/harceler by example: "to haggle, hucke, hedge, or paulter long in the buying of commodity".1611, Cotgrave, A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues, page 738
  4. To babble; to chatter.

Noun

paltering (plural palterings)

  1. Prevarication; dishonest bargaining, haggling.
    • After an houres debating and paltring both parties will goe from their words and oaths for the getting or saving of a shilling[…].1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 40, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC

Forms of paltering

pluralpalterings

Questions about paltering

What does paltering mean?
Paltering means prevarication; dishonest bargaining, haggling.
What is paltering the present participle and gerund of?
Paltering is the present participle and gerund of palter.
What part of speech is paltering?
Paltering is a noun.
What is the plural of paltering?
The plural of paltering is palterings.

Words near paltering in the dictionary

  1. palter
  2. paltered
  3. palterer
  4. palterers
  5. palterey
  6. paltering
  7. palterings
  8. palterly
  9. palters
  10. Palterton
  11. paltik

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: paltering (page history and authors); palter (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:

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