parrying
parrying is the present participle and gerund of parry.
Meaning of parry
Verb
parry (third-person singular simple present parries, present participle parrying, simple past and past participle parried)
- To avoid, deflect, or ward off (an attack, a blow, an argument, etc.).
- One had to be on one's guard when thus confronted and, in the course of my numerous meetings with him, I had on occasion to exercise all my wits and be prepared at a moment's notice to parry a very awkward question, to which I would much rather have given a considered reply.1944 March and April, Chas. S. Lake, “Some C.M.Es. I Have Known: VIII—Sir H. N. Gresley”, in Railway Magazine, page 74
Noun
parrying (plural parryings)
- The act of one who parries.
- The pair both want to touch each other, and indulge in a series of fencings and parryings in the hope of attaining their desire.1973, Alan Dundes, Mother Wit from the Laughing Barrel, page 253
Forms of parrying
| plural | parryings |
|---|
Phrases with parrying
Questions about parrying
- What does parrying mean?
- Parrying means the act of one who parries.
- What is parrying the present participle and gerund of?
- Parrying is the present participle and gerund of parry.
- What part of speech is parrying?
- Parrying is a noun.
- What is the plural of parrying?
- The plural of parrying is parryings.
Words near parrying in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: parrying (page history and authors); parry (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: “parrying.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/parrying. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.