Word.ws English Dictionary

tarring and feathering

tarring and feathering is the present participle and gerund of tar and feather.

Meaning of tar and feather

Verb

tar and feather (third-person singular simple present tars and feathers, present participle tarring and feathering, simple past and past participle tarred and feathered)

  1. (transitive) To cover (a person) in sticky tar, then cover in feathers which stick to the tar; an archaic means of humiliating a person.
    • 1855 — George A. Smith, Journal of Discourses, Volume 3 "Preaching the Gospel"
      "O," say they, "if you talk with a Mormon Elder, you are sure to get worsted; tar and feather them, mob them, and stone them out of the country, for if you listen to them, you will be deceived."

Questions about tarring and feathering

What is tarring and feathering the present participle and gerund of?
Tarring and feathering is the present participle and gerund of tar and feather.

Words near tarring and feathering in the dictionary

  1. tarrify
  2. tarrifying
  3. tarrily
  4. tarriness
  5. tarring
  6. tarring and feathering
  7. tarring out
  8. tarring with the same brush
  9. tarring with the same stick
  10. tarring-and-feathering
  11. tarrings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tarring and feathering (page history and authors); tar and feather (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: “tarring and feathering.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/tarring_and_feathering. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.