Eavesdroppings

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The act or instance of secretly listening to private conversations without permission ; the information obtained from such covert listening ; small collected droplets of water that fall from eaves during rainfall
2. Surreptitiously overhearing confidential talks ; the content captured through unnoticed auditory spying ; the drops of water that leak from the roof edge after rain
3. Listening in on others' private discussions without their knowledge ; the secret intelligence gathered from unauthorized auditory observation ; the precipitation that drips from the overhanging edges of a roof during wet weather

Etymology: "Eavesdroppings" is simply the plural of "eavesdropping," which is the noun formed from the verb "eavesdrop" plus the suffix "-ing." The literal sense of the base word comes first: the eaves of a house are the overhanging lower edge of a roof, and the drip that fell from that edge during rain was the "eavesdrop," a small strip of ground beneath the roof where water collected. Someone standing in that spot to catch what was said inside the house was, in effect, standing where the water fell, which gave the verb its figurative sense of listening in secretly. The plural form follows the three senses of the noun. It can name the act of covert listening, the information gained by it, or, in its oldest and most literal use, the drops of water falling from the eaves. Only the second and third senses are typically pluralised, which is why the word appears in the plural at all.

Synonyms: overhearings, listening, spyings