Wring
Pronunciation
- enPR: rÄng, IPA: /ɹɪŋ/
- US enPR: rÄ“ng, IPA: /ɹiËÅ‹/
- Homophones: ring
- Rhymes: -ɪŋ
Origin
From Middle English wringen, from Old English wringan, from Proto-Germanic *wringaną (compare West Frisian wringe, Low German wringen, Dutch wringen, German ringen ‘to wrestle’), from Proto-Indo-European *wrenǵʰ- (compare Lithuanian reñgtis ‘to bend down’, Ancient Greek ῥίμφα ‘fast’), nasalized variant of *werǵʰ- ‘bind, squeeze’. More at worry.
Full definition of wring
Verb
- To squeeze or twist tightly so that liquid is forced out.You must wring your wet jeans before hanging them out to dry.
- Bible, Judg. vi. 38He rose up early on the morrow, and thrust the fleece together, and wringed the dew out of the fleece.
- ShakespeareYour overkindness doth wring tears from me.
- To obtain by force.The police said they would wring the truth out of that heinous criminal.
- To hold tightly and press or twist.Some of the patients waiting in the dentist's office were wringing their hands nervously.He said he'd wring my neck if I told his girlfriend.He wrung my hand enthusiastically when he found out we were related.
- Francis BaconThe king began to find where his shoe did wring him.
- Bible, Leviticus i. 15The priest shall bring it dove unto the altar, and wring off his head.
- (intransitive) To writhe; to twist, as if in anguish.
- Shakespeare'Tis all men's office to speak patience
To those that wring under the load of sorrow. - To pain; to distress; to torment; to torture.
- ClarendonToo much grieved and wrung by an uneasy and strait fortune.
- AddisonDidst thou taste but half the griefs
That wring my soul, thou couldst not talk thus coldly. - To distort; to pervert; to wrest.
- WhitgiftHow dare men thus wring the Scriptures?
- To subject to extortion; to afflict, or oppress, in order to enforce compliance.
- ShakespeareTo wring the widow from her 'customed right.
- HaywardThe merchant adventurers have been often wronged and wringed to the quick.
- (nautical) To bend or strain out of its position.to wring a mast