singe
/sɪn(d)ʒ
/verb (singes, singeing, singed) [with object]
1Burn (something) superficially or lightly: the fire had singed his eyebrows (as adjective singed) a smell of singed feathers...
- Try not to set your sheets on fire or singe your eyebrows.
- ‘The inside wall was slightly singed but the fire brigade said I had been minutes away from losing the entire flat,’ he said.
- The fire also singed a turret of Holy Trinity Cathedral on Hart Street.
Synonyms
scorch, burn, sear, char, blacken
1.1 [no object] Be lightly or superficially burned: the heat was so intense I could feel the hairs on my hands singe...
- That's right, it's because we're human… we bleed when we're cut, we singe when we're burnt, and it all leaves so many little dents and scars.
- It singed and burned like hell itself, yet she did not flinch.
- In places the fabric had singed.
1.2Burn the bristles or down off (the carcass of a pig or fowl) to prepare it for cooking.After the pig had been bled, it was scalded or singed to loosen the bristles, which were scraped off.
noun
A superficial burn.The woman, aged 39, was able to walk to the ambulance before being taken to hospital with minor burns and singes....
- There wasn't a scratch or a singe on any of the vehicles.
- Some have black singes in the shape of half rings while others have complete crop circles scorched in, much like the markings on a perfectly seared scallop.
Origin
Old English sencgan, of West Germanic origin; related to Dutch zengen.
Rhymes
- Indian oak
- Indian Ocean
- Indianologist
- Indian orchard
- Indian ox
- Indian paint
- Indian path
- Indian peach
- Indian pear
- Indian pepper
- Indian physic
- Indian pink
- Indian pipe
- Indian plantain
- Indian plum
- Semite
- Semitic
- semitone
- semi-trailer
- semi-transparent
- semi-tropical
- semi-tropics
- semivowel
- semiweekly
- Semmelweis, Ignaz Philipp