Library / English Dictionary

DANGLE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Cause to dangle or hang freely

Example:

He dangled the ornaments from the Christmas tree

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "dangle" is one way to...):

suspend (hang freely)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something PP

Sentence example:

They dangle the lights from the ceiling

Derivation:

dangling (the act of suspending something (hanging it from above so it moves freely))

Sense 2

Meaning:

Hang freely

Example:

The light dropped from the ceiling

Synonyms:

dangle; drop; swing

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

Hypernyms (to "dangle" is one way to...):

hang (be suspended or hanging)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "dangle"):

droop; loll (hang loosely or laxly)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s
Something is ----ing PP

Sentence examples:

Some big birds dangle in the tree

There dangle some big birds in the tree

Credits

 Context examples: 

They walk across the bright stage of English history with their finicky step, their preposterous cravats, their high collars, their dangling seals, and they vanish into those dark wings from which there is no return.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

And now I see the outside of our house, with the latticed bedroom-windows standing open to let in the sweet-smelling air, and the ragged old rooks'-nests still dangling in the elm-trees at the bottom of the front garden.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

He was dressed in a long gray gown, and wore a broad hat of the same color, much weather-stained, with three scallop-shells dangling from the brim.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The climb was a more simple thing now that the rope dangled down the face of the worst part of the ascent.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Among the great beams, bulks, and ringbolts of the ship, and the emigrant-berths, and chests, and bundles, and barrels, and heaps of miscellaneous baggage—“lighted up, here and there, by dangling lanterns; and elsewhere by the yellow daylight straying down a windsail or a hatchway—were crowded groups of people, making new friendships, taking leave of one another, talking, laughing, crying, eating and drinking; some, already settled down into the possession of their few feet of space, with their little households arranged, and tiny children established on stools, or in dwarf elbow-chairs; others, despairing of a resting-place, and wandering disconsolately.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

But whilst they were getting all ready, they heard the trampling of a horse at a distance, which so frightened them that they pushed their prisoner neck and shoulders together into a sack, and swung him up by a cord to the tree, where they left him dangling, and ran away.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

They could only have come from the old man at my side, and yet he sat now as absorbed as ever, very thin, very wrinkled, bent with age, an opium pipe dangling down from between his knees, as though it had dropped in sheer lassitude from his fingers.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It was but a short walk, and yet it took us some time, for my uncle stalked along with great dignity, his lace-bordered handkerchief in one hand, and his cane with the clouded amber head dangling from the other.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The thin cord dangling down the face of the brown cliff seemed from above to reach little more than half-way down it.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The master of this shop was sitting at the door in his shirt-sleeves, smoking; and as there were a great many coats and pairs of trousers dangling from the low ceiling, and only two feeble candles burning inside to show what they were, I fancied that he looked like a man of a revengeful disposition, who had hung all his enemies, and was enjoying himself.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)