Word.ws English Dictionary

sell by the candle

sell by the candle verb: to offer for sale by auction as long as a small piece of candle burns; the winning bid is the last one made before the flame goes out.

Verb

sell by the candle (third-person singular simple present sells by the candle, present participle selling by the candle, simple past and past participle sold by the candle)

  1. (historical) To offer for sale by auction as long as a small piece of candle burns; the winning bid is the last one made before the flame goes out.

Forms of sell by the candle

third-person singular presentsells by the candle
present participleselling by the candle
past participlesold by the candle
pastsold by the candle

Questions about sell by the candle

What does sell by the candle mean?
Sell by the candle means to offer for sale by auction as long as a small piece of candle burns; the winning bid is the last one made before the flame goes out.
What part of speech is sell by the candle?
Sell by the candle is a verb.
What is the past tense of sell by the candle?
The past tense of sell by the candle is sold by the candle.

Words near sell by the candle in the dictionary

  1. Selkups
  2. sell
  3. sell against the box
  4. sell away
  5. sell bargains
  6. sell by the candle
  7. sell coal to Newcastle
  8. sell coals to Newcastle
  9. sell dearly
  10. sell down
  11. sell down the river

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sell by the candle (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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