Word.ws English Dictionary

thirling

thirling noun: the act of boring or perforating. Also the present participle and gerund of thirl.

Noun

thirling (plural thirlings)

  1. The act of boring or perforating
  2. (coal-mining) Same as thirl
    Synonyms:
    thirl
  3. (Northern England) In lead-mining, a mark indicating the termination of a set or pitch

Also used as

thirling is also the present participle and gerund of thirl.

Synonyms of thirling

Forms of thirling

pluralthirlings
alternative formthurling

Origin of thirling

From Middle English thurlunge, from Old English þȳrlung (“piercing”), verbal noun of þȳrlian (“to pierce”). Equivalent to thirl + -ing.

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Questions about thirling

What does thirling mean?
Thirling means the act of boring or perforating.
What part of speech is thirling?
Thirling is a noun.
What is the plural of thirling?
The plural of thirling is thirlings.

Words near thirling in the dictionary

  1. thirlages
  2. Thirlby
  3. Thirlbys
  4. Thirldene
  5. thirled
  6. thirling
  7. thirlings
  8. Thirlmere
  9. thirls
  10. Thirlstane
  11. Thirlwall

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: thirling (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: “thirling.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/thirling. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.