Cursing

How to spell cursing

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce cursing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does cursing mean?

1. verbUsing offensive, profane, or obscene language.
2. verbCalling down misfortune, harm, or evil upon someone or something.

Cursing in a sentence

• He kept cursing under his breath as the traffic crawled along.

• The old legend describes a witch cursing the entire village.

• The referee warned both players for cursing on the pitch.

• He stood at the gate, cursing the rival family for their betrayal.

Where does cursing come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word grows out of the Old English noun 'curs', meaning a prayer or invocation calling down harm or misfortune on someone, with the matching verb 'cursian' meaning to wish such harm. Its deeper origin is genuinely uncertain; scholars have suggested links to Latin and to Old French sources, but no single ancestor is securely proven, which is unusual for so common a word. Over the medieval period the religious sense (formally condemning or excommunicating someone) sat alongside the everyday sense of wishing ill, and from there it broadened into the modern meaning of swearing or using foul language. The present participle 'cursing' simply adds the -ing ending, and as with most verbs ending in a silent e, that e is dropped before the suffix, so it is never spelled 'curseing'. The hard c kept its s rather than shifting, so the only real spelling decision is remembering to drop the e.

How the word is built

• curse (from Old English curs)
• -ing (present participle/gerund); the silent final e of 'curse' is dropped before the suffix