ing

Meaning

Noun

• A meadow, especially a low meadow near a river; water meadow.
• The letter for the ng sound in Pitman shorthand.

Origin

• From Middle English ing, ynge, enge, from Old English ing, *eng, from Proto-Germanic *angijō ("meadow"), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂énkos ("a bend; curve; bowl; hollow; dell; glen"), from *h₂énk-. Cognate with Scots eng ("ing; meadow"), Dutch eng ("pasture; farmland"), Danish eng ("meadow"), Swedish äng ("meadow; field"), Norwegian eng, Faroese ong, Icelandic eng, Icelandic engi.
• : From Pitman em and en, which it is related to phonetically and graphically, and the sound it represents. The change in vowel probably reflects the familiar suffix -ing.