Stocking

How to spell stocking

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce stocking

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does stocking mean?

1. nounA close-fitting knitted or woven covering for the foot and leg, usually worn by women.
2. nounA large decorative sock hung up at Christmas to be filled with small gifts.

Stocking in a sentence

• A thread snagged and laddered her left stocking.

• Each child hung a stocking above the fireplace on Christmas Eve.

• He found a single silk stocking at the bottom of the drawer.

• She tucked an orange and some chocolate into every stocking.

Where does stocking come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word grew out of the Old English noun stocc, which meant a tree trunk, stump, or post, the same root that gives us the everyday word stock. By the sixteenth century English speakers were calling close-fitting leg coverings stocks, and the lower garments worn on the foot and shin were known as nether-stocks, literally the lower stocks. The diminutive ending -ing attached to this sense produced stocking, and the form quickly took over as the ordinary name for a knitted or woven covering for the foot and leg. The link to a wooden stump may seem odd, but it likely reflects the idea of something fitted snugly around a limb, just as a sleeve fits an arm. The festive Christmas stocking, hung up to be filled with gifts, is a much later sentimental use that keeps the same spelling, simply doubling the c of stock before the suffix.

How the word is built

• stock (covering for the leg, from Old English stocc)
• -ing (noun suffix)