Stinge

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To prick or wound someone with a sharp pointed organ that injects venom ; a sharp sudden pain or the wound it leaves behind
2. To jab or pierce the skin with a venomous point ; a keen, smarting pain or the mark left by such a jab
3. To wound with a needle-like organ that delivers poison ; the sharp smarting pain or puncture resulting from that wound

Etymology: "Stinge" is an English verb, and its origin is uncertain. The most likely explanation is that it was formed backwards from "stingy," the adjective meaning mean or unwilling to spend, with the "-y" ending stripped away as if it were a suffix. In that case the verb would have been created by analogy with a word that already existed, rather than being inherited from older English or borrowed from another language. Back-formations like this are common in English: "burgle" was made from "burglar" in the same way, and "edit" from "editor." The direction of the change is usually visible because the base word is the older, more familiar form. Here the adjective "stingy" is the older word, so the verb is the one that appears to have been derived from it.

Synonyms: sting