Lingering

How to spell lingering

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce lingering

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does lingering mean?

1. adjectiveSlow to fade, end, or go away; persisting longer than expected.
2. verbPresent participle of linger: staying in a place or delaying departure longer than necessary.

Lingering in a sentence

• adjective

  A lingering smell of paint filled the new office for a week.

• verb

  A few guests were still lingering by the door after the meeting ended.

• adjective

  She still had lingering doubts about signing the contract.

• verb

  He kept lingering near the counter, hoping for a refund.

Where does lingering come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The word grows from the verb 'linger', which traces back to the Old English lengan, meaning 'to prolong' or 'to make long', itself built on lang, the ancestor of modern 'long'. In Middle English it took the frequentative '-er' ending that gives a sense of repeated or drawn-out action, so 'linger' came to mean to dawdle, to delay leaving, or to remain longer than expected. The underlying idea has always been about something stretching out in time, refusing to end quickly. The present participle 'lingering' then settled into use both as a verb form and as an adjective for anything that persists, such as a smell, a doubt, or an illness. The whole family is solidly Germanic, sharing its 'long' root with German lang and Dutch lang, and the spelling stays regular: just add '-ing' to 'linger', with no doubled consonant despite the soft middle sound.

How the word is built

• linger (from Old English lengan: to prolong, make long)
• -ing (present participle / adjective suffix)