Beetling

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Having a part that sticks out sharply over or beyond the surrounding area
2. Describing a feature that juts forward or extends outward notably
3. Characterized by an aspect that projects conspicuously or looms ahead

Etymology: Beetling is the present participle of "beetle", used as an adjective, and it has nothing to do with the insect in its origin. The verb "beetle" meant "to overhang" or "to jut out" and comes from the noun "beetle", a mallet or heavy hammer, from Old English "bītel", which in turn is tied to the verb "beat". A beetle was a tool for pounding, so something that beetles sticks out like a hammer head over the edge of what is beneath it. The verb's sense of projecting forward is the key link. The insect "beetle" shares the spelling but comes from a different source, and the name was applied to the bug only later, as an English word for it. The mallet sense is the older, native meaning, rooted in the Germanic idea of striking. Our adjective therefore describes brows, cliffs or ledges that hang over something below, and the overhang is the whole of its meaning.

Synonyms: projecting, overhanging