dung

CEFRB2

/ˈdʌŋ/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    Animal waste, especially used as fertilizer.

  2. 02

    noun

    Extra detail

    A tailor's employee, usually one who is paid by the piece rather than by the day.

Examples

  • Rotten wood cannot be carved; walls of dung cannot be worked with a trowel.

  • The dung beetle started to roll a ball away.

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
1

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A type of manure, as from a particular species or type of animal.

  2. Manure; animal excrement.

verb

Extra meaning

  1. To fertilize with dung.

More examples

In context

  • You ask me, child, what love is? A star in a pile of dung.

  • Behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts; and one shall take you away with it.

  • She had been dunging the roses and was fairly covered in muck.

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The gardener spread fresh blank around the rose bushes for fertilizer.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

From Middle English dung, dunge, donge, from Old English dung (“dung; excrement; manure”), from Proto-West Germanic *dungu, from Proto-Germanic *dungō (“dung”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰengʰ- (“to cover”). Superseded non-native Middle English fen (“dung, excrement, filth”), from Old French fien, fiente (“dung, manure”).