threatening

verb
/ˈθɹɛtə.nɪŋ/

Etymology

From Middle English thretenyng, thretnynge, þretnynge, equivalent to threaten + -ing.

  1. inherited from thretenyng

Definitions

  1. present participle and gerund of threaten

  2. Presenting a threat, posing a likely risk of harm.

    • Never turn your back to someone who is displaying threatening behavior.
    • Fie, fie, vnknit that thretaning vnkinde brovv, / And dart not ſcornefull glances from thoſe eies, / To vvound thy Lord, thy King, thy Gouernour.
  3. Making threats, making statements about a willingness to cause harm.

  4. + 1 more definition
    1. An act of threatening

      An act of threatening; a threat.

      • And nowe lorde beholde their threatenyngꝭ / and graunte vnto thy ſervauntꝭ wyth all confydence to ſpeake thy worde.
      • In Mr. J. C. Hotten’s Life, and in Mr. A. W. Ward’s admirable monograph in the “English Men of Letters” Series, a paper of mine called “Pincher Astray” is attributed to Dickens.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at threatening. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01threatening02threats03threat04injure05harm06detriment07charge08enemy

A definitional loop anchored at threatening. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

8 hops · closes at threatening

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA