stinking

• IPA^(key): /ˈstɪŋkɪŋ/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪŋkɪŋ

From Middle English stynkynge, stinkinge, stinkinde, stinkende, stynkande, stynkand, from Old English stincende, from Proto-Germanic *stinkwandz (“stinking”), present participle of Proto-Germanic *stinkwaną (“to stink”), equivalent to stink +‎ -ing. Cognate with Dutch stinkend (“stinking, stinky”), German stinkend (“stinking, stinky”), Danish stinkende (“stinking, stinky”), Norwegian stinkende (“stinking, stinky”).

stinking (comparative more stinking, superlative most stinking)

1. Having a pungent smell.
2. Very bad and undesirable.

   I have a stinking cold.

3. (slang) Very drunk.
   • 2021, Mack Morriss, South Pacific Diary, 1942-1943:

     Oh, I got stinking—and, worse, acted like the world's worst heel to top it off. I passed out mentally about the time we left the club—which must have been around 2:30—but unfortunately didn't pass out physically.

4. (euphemistic) An intensifier, a hypallage.

   We don’t need your stinking sympathy.

   • 2005, Annabelle du Fouet, “Kinksters and kinksterettes—Who are these people, anyway?” (chapter 1), in Weather Balloons Make Rotten Sex Toys, Ellora's Cave, →ISBN, page 27:

     “Everyone shut up! Lord ThunderSteel commands it! I am your leader! I have this badge that says so!”
     “We don’t need no stinking badges!”

stinking

1. present participle and gerund of stink

From Middle English stinkinge, stynkynge, equivalent to stink +‎ -ing.

stinking (plural stinkings)

1. The emission of a foul smell.
   • 2013, Phaedra. C Pezzullo, Cultural Studies and Environment, Revisited, page 42:

     From the magnificent ejaculation of the Waimangu geyser, to the tiniest of gaseous emissions, descriptions of the thermal reserve were rife with dischargings, bubblings and stinkings, quiverings and palpitations, orifices and protuberances.

stinking

1. alternative form of stynkynge