Hauling

How to spell hauling

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce hauling

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does hauling mean?

1. verbPulling or transporting something heavy with sustained physical force or by vehicle.

Hauling in a sentence

• The movers spent all morning hauling furniture up three flights of stairs.

• The truck was hauling a load of gravel to the building site.

Where does hauling come from?

Language of origin: French

The verb haul comes from the Old French haler, meaning 'to pull or drag', which itself was rooted in a Germanic source related to Old Frisian halia and Old High German halon, both meaning 'to fetch or summon'. English adopted it in the late medieval period, and for a long time it was written 'hale', a spelling that survives in the phrase 'hale a rope'. The form 'haul' became fixed by the 1500s, especially in nautical use where sailors hauled on ropes to trim sails and shift cargo. The present participle 'hauling' simply adds the standard -ing ending, and the spelling trap is the 'au' vowel cluster, which sounds like a plain 'aw' yet is written with two letters. Because of the seafaring history, hauling still carries the sense of dragging something heavy by sustained physical effort.

How the word is built

• haul (to pull forcibly)
• -ing (present participle / gerund suffix)