English
firing
Pronunciation
  • IPA: /ˈfaɪɹɪŋ/
Noun

firing

  1. (ceramics) The process of applying heat or fire, especially to clay etc to produce pottery.
    After the pots have been glazed, they go back into the kiln for a second firing.
  2. The fuel for a fire.
    • circa 1611, William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act 2, Scene 2,
      No more dams I’ll make for fish;
      Nor fetch in firing
      At requiring […]
    • 1933, George Orwell, Down and Out in Paris and London, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1961, Chapter 25, p. 133,
      Downstairs there was a kitchen common to all lodgers, with free firing and a supply of cooking-pots, tea-basins, and toasting-forks.
  3. The discharge of a gun or other weapon.
    • 1719, Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, London: W. Taylor, p. 308,
      […] they fir’d several Times, making other Signals for the Boat.
      At last, when all their Signals and Firings prov’d fruitless, and they found the Boat did not stir, we saw them by the Help of my Glasses, hoist another Boat out, and row towards the Shore […]
    • 1940, Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls, London: Jonathan Cape, Chapter 43, p. 417,
      He heard the firing and as he walked he felt it in the pit of his stomach as though it echoed on his own diaphragm.
  4. The dismissal of someone from a job.
    • 2016, Matthew d'Ancona, “Theresa May’s Shock Therapy,” The New York Times, 19 July, 2016,
      Even the most seasoned analysts of British politics were struck by the brutality of Ms. May’s hirings and firings.
  5. Cauterization.
Translations Verb
  1. present participle of fire#English|fire


This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002
Offline English dictionary