Library / English Dictionary

FLAPPING

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

The motion made by flapping up and down

Synonyms:

flap; flapping; flutter; fluttering

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural events

Hypernyms ("flapping" is a kind of...):

undulation; wave ((physics) a movement up and down or back and forth)

Derivation:

flap (move noisily)

flap (move in a wavy pattern or with a rising and falling motion)

flap (move with a flapping motion)

flap (move with a thrashing motion)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

-ing form of the verb flap

Credits

 Context examples: 

But the poor young ravens lay upon the ground, flapping their wings, and crying: Oh, what helpless chicks we are!

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

This ended the saying of the charm, and they heard a great chattering and flapping of wings, as the band of Winged Monkeys flew up to them.

(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)

His bolt struck the stork just where its wing meets the body, and the bird whirled aloft in a last convulsive flutter before falling wounded and flapping to the earth.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The second mast was yet standing, with the rags of a rent sail, and a wild confusion of broken cordage flapping to and fro.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

And he has been flapping those grim wings to some purpose of late—Lucy's mother and Arthur's father, and now....

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Each wore a large, flapping hat, a brown linen pouch slung over one shoulder, and carried a long staff.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

From this crawling flapping mass of obscene reptilian life came the shocking clamor which filled the air and the mephitic, horrible, musty odor which turned us sick.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The authors proposed that, in Caudipteryx, from a mechanical perspective, two-legged running automatically induced wing flapping.

(Scientific study suggests dinosaurs flapped their wings as they ran, Wikinews)

I gazed entranced, till the boat ran into the wind and the flapping sail warned me I was not attending to my duties.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

The two men were hurried to their corners, one second sponging them down and the other flapping a towel in front of their face; whilst they, with arms hanging down and legs extended, tried to draw all the air they could into their lungs in the brief space allowed them.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)