lightning

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English [edit]

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lightning

Etymology [edit]

light(e)n + -ing

Pronunciation [edit]

Noun [edit]

lightning (usually uncountable; plural lightnings)

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  1. A flash of light produced by short-duration, high-voltage discharge of electricity within a cloud, between clouds, or between a cloud and the earth.
    Although we did not see the lightning, we did hear the thunder.
    • 1901, E. L. Morris, The Child's Eden, page 16:
      It was the thought of hot July and August days, when the clouds piled up like woolly mountains, and lightnings streaked the sky.
  2. A discharge of this kind.
    The lightning was hot enough to melt the sand.
    That tree was hit by lightning.
    • 1881, Daniel Pierce Thompson, The Green Mountain Boys, page 281:
      The rain at length ceased; and the lightnings, as they played along the black parapet of clouds, that lay piled in the east, shone with less dazzling fierceness, […]
  3. (figuratively) Anything that moves very fast.
    • 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot, chapter V:
      Nobs, though, was lightning by comparison with the slow thinking beast and dodged his opponent's thrust with ease. Then he raced to the rear of the tremendous thing and seized it by the tail.
  4. The act of making bright, or the state of being made bright; enlightenment; brightening, as of the mental powers.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.

Quotations [edit]

  • 2008, Kathy Clark, Stand By Your Man, page 280:
    Manny drove a few miles per hour under the speed limit, entranced by the awesome display of lightning streaking out of the clouds toward earth.

Derived terms [edit]

Translations [edit]

flash of light
discharge

Adjective [edit]

lightning (not comparable)

  1. Extremely fast or sudden.
  2. Moving at the speed of lightning.

Translations [edit]

lightning fast

Verb [edit]

lightning (third-person singular simple present lightnings, present participle lightninging, simple past and past participle lightninged)

  1. (impersonal, childish or nonstandard) To produce lightning.
    • 1916, Dorothy Canfield Fisher, Understood Betsy
      Or if it thundered and lightninged, Aunt Frances always dropped everything she might be doing and held Elizabeth Ann tightly in her arms until it was all over.
    • 1968, Dan Greenburg, Chewsday: a sex novel
      The next day, though it is not only raining but thundering and lightninging as well, antiquing is seen by three-fourths of those present as a lesser evil than free play.
    • 1987, Tricia Springstubb, Eunice Gottlieb and the unwhitewashed truth about life
      "Hey!" yelled Reggie, pulling her back. "Get in here! It's lightninging. I don't want a charcoal-broiled friend!"
    • 1988, Carlo Collodi, Roberto Innocenti, The adventures of Pinocchio
      I don't know, Father, but believe me, it has been a horrible night — one that I'll never forget. It thundered and lightninged, and I was very hungry.

Usage notes [edit]

  • bolt, flash, strike are some of the words used to count lightning.
  • The standard, but rare, verb for "lightning occurs" is lighten, used only in the impersonal form "it lightens", or as "it’s lightening".
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