Whipping

How to spell whipping

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce whipping

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does whipping mean?

1. verbStriking repeatedly with a whip, lash, or any flexible thing, or the act of such striking.
2. verbBeating cream, eggs, or a similar mixture rapidly to make it light and thick.

Whipping in a sentence

• The gale was whipping the loose tarpaulin against the scaffolding all night.

• Whipping the cream by hand took far longer than she had expected.

• She described the whipping of the bare branches in the high wind.

• He added sugar while whipping the egg whites into stiff peaks.

Where does whipping come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The base verb 'whip' comes from Middle English 'wippen', meaning to move briskly, swing, or flick, which is closely related to Middle Dutch and Middle Low German 'wippen', meaning to swing or leap up. The underlying Germanic sense was of a quick darting or oscillating motion, which is why the word came to describe the rapid lash of a flexible cord and then the cord itself. By the time English speakers were forming 'whipping' in the 1400s and 1500s, the word covered both the literal striking with such a cord and the brisk beating of food to a froth, since both involve fast repeated motion. The doubled 'p' that catches spellers is purely mechanical: 'whip' ends in a single vowel followed by a single consonant, so the 'p' is doubled before '-ing' to keep the short vowel sound. The same doubling rule explains 'whipped', and remembering 'whip' as the root makes the spelling of 'whipping' fall into place.

How the word is built

• whip (to strike or beat)
• -p- (doubled consonant)
• -ing (verb/noun suffix)