Drumming

How to spell drumming

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce drumming

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does drumming mean?

1. verbBeating a drum or playing drums, especially as a continuous activity.
2. verbMaking a continuous rhythmic tapping or pounding sound or motion.

Drumming in a sentence

• The band spent the whole afternoon drumming in the rehearsal studio.

• The rain was drumming steadily against the office window all morning.

• He kept drumming on the kit until his arms ached.

• He sat drumming his fingers on the desk while waiting for the meeting to start.

Where does drumming come from?

Language of origin: Dutch

The base word drum entered English in the mid 1500s, borrowed from the Middle Dutch and Low German tromme or tromle, names for the percussion instrument. Those forms were almost certainly imitative, echoing the dull, resonant sound the instrument makes when struck. English took the short, blunt form drum and, like other one-syllable verbs ending in a single consonant after a short vowel, doubled the final m before adding -ing, which is exactly why the spelling carries two m's. The doubling rule is the whole trap here: the single-m drum becomes the double-m drumming, mirroring run to running and swim to swimming. From the literal beating of a drum the word spread to any steady, repetitive tapping or pounding, such as fingers on a desk or rain on a roof.

How the word is built

• drum (from Middle Dutch/Low German trom, an imitative word for the instrument)
• -m- (consonant doubled after a short stressed vowel)
• -ing (present participle / gerund suffix)