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GRINDING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A harsh and strident sound (as of the grinding of gears)
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("grinding" is a kind of...):
noise (sound of any kind (especially unintelligible or dissonant sound))
Derivation:
grind (make a grating or grinding sound by rubbing together)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Material resulting from the process of grinding
Example:
vegetable grindings clogged the drain
Classified under:
Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)
Hypernyms ("grinding" is a kind of...):
atom; corpuscle; molecule; mote; particle; speck ((nontechnical usage) a tiny piece of anything)
Derivation:
grind (reduce to small pieces or particles by pounding or abrading)
Sense 3
Meaning:
The wearing down of rock particles by friction due to water or wind or ice
Synonyms:
abrasion; attrition; detrition; grinding
Classified under:
Nouns denoting natural phenomena
Hypernyms ("grinding" is a kind of...):
friction; rubbing (the resistance encountered when one body is moved in contact with another)
Derivation:
grind (reduce to small pieces or particles by pounding or abrading)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb grind
Context examples:
Still kneeling upon the floor he bent forward and threw all his weight and strength upon some lever, with the result that there came a long, whirling, grinding noise, ending once more in a powerful click.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
But my aunt, suddenly descrying among them the young malefactor who was the donkey's guardian, and who was one of the most inveterate offenders against her, though hardly in his teens, rushed out to the scene of action, pounced upon him, captured him, dragged him, with his jacket over his head, and his heels grinding the ground, into the garden, and, calling upon Janet to fetch the constables and justices, that he might be taken, tried, and executed on the spot, held him at bay there.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
He was a man who wrought hard at all that he turned his hand to; but he heated himself in grinding bones to mix with his flour, and so through over-diligence he brought a fever upon himself and died.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Oh, that I could give any idea of the scene; of that sweet, sweet, good, good woman in all the radiant beauty of her youth and animation, with the red scar on her forehead, of which she was conscious, and which we saw with grinding of our teeth—remembering whence and how it came; her loving kindness against our grim hate; her tender faith against all our fears and doubting; and we, knowing that so far as symbols went, she with all her goodness and purity and faith, was outcast from God.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
I trust that the labour and hazard of an investigation—of which the smallest results have been slowly pieced together, in the pressure of arduous avocations, under grinding penurious apprehensions, at rise of morn, at dewy eve, in the shadows of night, under the watchful eye of one whom it were superfluous to call Demon—combined with the struggle of parental Poverty to turn it, when completed, to the right account, may be as the sprinkling of a few drops of sweet water on my funeral pyre. I ask no more.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The door is shut, and the chains rattle; there is a grinding of the key in the lock; I can hear the key withdraw: then another door opens and shuts; I hear the creaking of lock and bolt.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
