Staggering

How to spell staggering

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce staggering

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does staggering mean?

1. adjectiveSo large, surprising, or shocking that it is almost overwhelming.
2. verbWalking or moving unsteadily, as if about to fall.

Staggering in a sentence

• adjective

  The final repair bill came to a staggering amount of money.

• verb

  The exhausted runner was staggering across the finish line.

• adjective

  The company reported a staggering rise in profits this quarter.

• verb

  He kept staggering along the icy pavement, struggling to stay upright.

Where does staggering come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

This word grows out of the verb 'stagger', which English took from the Old Norse 'stakra', meaning to push or to totter, a frequentative form of 'staka', to push or shove. The earliest recorded English spelling was actually 'stacker', and the modern form settled with the doubled 'g' by the sixteenth century. Its first sense described the literal lurching, unsteady walk of someone who has lost their balance through drink, exhaustion, or a blow. From that physical image of being knocked off balance came the figurative sense of something so overwhelming that it metaphorically leaves a person reeling, which is how 'staggering' came to mean astonishingly large or shocking. The doubled 'g' before the '-ing' is the spelling trap, since the short stressed vowel in 'stag' forces the consonant to double before the suffix.

How the word is built

• stagger (to sway or reel)
• -ing (present participle / adjective suffix)