trolling
UK/ˈtɹɒlɪŋ//ˈtɹoʊlɪŋ/
trolling is the present participle and gerund of troll.
Noun
trolling (plural trollings)
- The act of one who trolls (in various senses of provoking others).
- A fishing technique in which one or more baited fishing lines are dragged by a moving boat. Not to be confused with trawling, which drags a net.
Meaning of troll
Verb
troll (third-person singular simple present trolls, present participle trolling, simple past and past participle trolled)
- To move (something, especially a round object) by, or as if by, rolling; to bowl, to roll, to trundle.
- Take trustie (to trust to) that thinkest to thee, / That trustily thriftines trowleth to thee.1878, Thomas Tusser, “A Briefe Conclusion, where You may See, ech Word in the Verse, to Begin with a T”, in Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie. […], London: Published for the English Dialect...
- Often followed by in: to cause (something) to flow or roll in like a stream.
- To roll; also, to turn round and round; to rotate, to spin, to whirl.
- Mrs Putler, this is Lady—Lady—these tamn'd Southern names rin out o' my head like a stane trowling down hill— […]1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter XIII, in Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume IV, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and...
- To move or walk at a leisurely pace; to ramble, to saunter, to stroll.
- Prepoſt'rous foole, thou troul'ſt amiſſe: / Thou err'ſt; That's not the vvay, 'Tis this: / Thy hopes, inſtructed by thine Eye, / Make thee appeare more neare than I; […]1635, Fra[ncis] Quarles, “Canto XI. Mat[thew] VII. XIV.”, in Emblemes, London: […] G[eorge] M[iller] and sold at at Iohn Marriots shope […], →OCLC, book II, stanza 1, page 105
- Chiefly of a man: synonym of cruise (“to stroll about to find a (male) sexual partner”).
- Followed by in: to flow or roll in like a stream.
- This little ape gets money by the sack-full, / It trolls upon her.c. 1623 (date written; published 1653), Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, Thomas Dekker, John Ford, “The Spanish Gipsy”, in A[rthur] H[enry] Bullen, editor, The Works of Thomas Middleton […] (The...
Forms of trolling
| plural | trollings |
|---|
Words formed from trolling
Phrases with trolling
Words that rhyme with trolling
Questions about trolling
- What does trolling mean?
- Trolling means the act of one who trolls (in various senses of provoking others).
- What is trolling the present participle and gerund of?
- Trolling is the present participle and gerund of troll.
- What part of speech is trolling?
- Trolling is a noun.
- How do you pronounce trolling?
- Trolling is pronounced /ˈtɹɒlɪŋ/ (UK).
- What is the plural of trolling?
- The plural of trolling is trollings.
Words near trolling in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: trolling (page history and authors); troll (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-trolling.wav.
Cite this entry: “trolling.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/trolling. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
