lightning
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈlaɪt.nɪŋ/
ipa: /ˈlaɪt.nɪŋ/
ipa: [ˈlʌɪ̯ʔ.nɪŋ]
ipa: [ˈlɐɪ̯ʔ.nɪŋ]
rhymes: -aɪtnɪŋ
Forms: form: lightnings
Etymology: From light(e)n + -ing. Doublet of lightening.
Senses: examples: text: Although we did not see the lightning, we did hear the thunder.
text: Canst thou send lightnings, that they may go, and say unto thee, Here we are?
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Job 38:35:
text: It was the thought of hot July and August days, when the clouds piled up like woolly mountains, and lightnings streaked the sky.
ref: 1901, E. L. Morris, The Child's Eden, page 16:
text: Manny drove a few miles per hour under the speed limit, entranced by the awesome display of lightning streaking out of the clouds toward earth.
ref: 2008, Kathy Clark, Stand By Your Man, page 280:
text: "Ruu": The adults in the village all said that children like me could calm the lightning and turn the storms into timely rain.
ref: 2021 October 13, Genshin Impact, v2.2, miHoYo, iOS, Android, Windows, PS4, level/area: The Sun-Wheel and Mt. Kanna:
glosses: A flash of light produced by short-duration, high-voltage discharge of electricity within a cloud, between clouds, or between a cloud and the earth.
examples: text: The lightning was hot enough to melt the sand.
text: That tree was hit by lightning.
text: Auster and Aquilon with winged Steeds
All ſweating, tilt about the watery heauens,
With ſhiuering ſpeares enforcing thunderclaps,
And from their ſhields ſtrike flames of lightening
ref: c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act III, scene ii:
text: The rain at length ceased; and the lightnings, as they played along the black parapet of clouds, that lay piled in the east, shone with less dazzling fierceness, […]
ref: 1881, Daniel Pierce Thompson, The Green Mountain Boys, page 281:
glosses: A discharge of this kind.
examples: text: Nobs, though, was lightning by comparison with the slow thinking beast and dodged his opponent's thrust with ease. Then he raced to the rear of the tremendous thing and seized it by the tail.
ref: 1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp., →OCLC; republished as chapter V, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927, →OCLC:
glosses: Anything that moves very fast.
examples: text: I took some gin but it did little to calm my mood. […] 'Come now, Bess,' she entreated, and poured another glass of lightning. 'Tell your old mother everything.' I took a gulp of the spirit, then babbled all, showing her the loot now in my possession.
ref: 2017, Jake Arnott, The Fatal Tree:
glosses: Gin.
glosses: Obsolete form of lightening.
Coordinate terms: english: noise
translation: noise
word: thunder
english: instance
translation: instance
word: thunderbolt
word: fulgural
Derived terms: ball lightning
bead lightning
CG lightning
chain lightning
Chicago lightning
dry lightning
fast as lightning
forked lightning
fork lightning
fossilized lightning
globe lightning
globular lightning
greased lightning
heat lightning
IC lightning
Jersey lightning
Jewish lightning
lightning arrester
lightning bird
lightning bolt
lightning bruiser
lightning bug
lightning carrier
lightning chess
lightning conductor
lightning crotch
lightning detector
lightning discharger
lightning does not strike twice in the same place
lightning doesn't strike twice in the same place
lightning fast
lightning in a bottle
lightninglike
lightningly
lightning mapper
lightning never strikes twice
lightning never strikes twice in the same place
lightningproof
lightning protection system
lightning-quick
lightning rod
lightning round
lightning sketch
lightning speed
lightning storm
lightning strike
lightning talk
lightning war
like lightning
quick as lightning
ride the lightning
scarlet lightning
sheet lightning
spider lightning
superlightning
thunder and lightning
upward lightning
volcanic lightning
white lightning