Turning

How to spell turning

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce turning

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does turning mean?

1. verbRotating, changing direction, or causing something to move around a central point.
2. nounA place where a road bends or where one road branches off another.

Turning in a sentence

• verb

  The mechanic noticed the wheel was turning unevenly.

• noun

  Take the second turning on the left after the petrol station.

• verb

  She kept turning the pages, searching for the missing receipt.

• noun

  The cottage sits just beyond a sharp turning in the lane.

Where does turning come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word is built on the verb 'turn', which traces back to the Latin 'tornare', meaning 'to turn on a lathe' or 'to round off', itself drawn from 'tornus', the lathe or turner's tool, a borrowing from the Greek 'tornos', a tool for drawing circles. Late Latin and Vulgar Latin carried the sense of rotating and shaping, and the verb entered Old English as 'turnian' or 'tyrnan', later reinforced by the Old French 'torner'. By adding the productive English suffix '-ing', speakers formed both the present participle and a noun naming the action or, especially in British usage, a place where a road bends or branches off. The simple doubling-free spelling, with a single 'n' before '-ing', rarely troubles writers, since the base verb ends in a single consonant after a vowel that is not stressed-then-doubled.

How the word is built

• turn (to rotate or change direction)
• -ing (forming a verbal noun or present participle)