wince
wince (wins)
intransitive verb winced, winc′·ing
to shrink or draw back slightly, usually with a grimace, as in pain, embarrassment, alarm, etc.
Etymology: ME wynsen < Anglo-Fr var. of OFr guenchir < Frank *wenkjan, akin to OHG wankon, to totter, turn: for IE base see winch
noun
the act or an instance of wincing
wince (wins)
noun
a roller used between dyeing vats to facilitate the transfer of pieces of cloth
Etymology: var. of winch
wince
v.
Object
Converse of object
- make: The caliber of the delivery team is enough to make many community projects wince.
Preposition: at
- memory: Very happy... " His face winced at some memory.
- pain: She clamped her teeth together and winced at the sudden pain.
- building: All too often I wince at the poor buildings my constituents have inherited from a previous era which they experience everyday.
- cost: I do have to say that I did wince at the cost tho.
Modifying Another Word
- visibly: He winces visibly for a moment, and then it is done.
- slightly: You can almost hear him struggling to sound like someone he's not which is slightly wincing.
- still: I still wince at some of the naïve mistakes we made.
- not: In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud.
- again: The boy winced again; but he went on: " Well, I know that.
- never: He never winced - never moved a muscle, but went down as tho Martha Jones had not touched him.
Noun used with modifier
- man: But the very thought of the operatic castrati today is enough to make a grown man wince.
- people: Actually, that made a lot of people wince!
Used with why or when
- when: A man will show no pain while taking the most ferocious beating but will wince when a woman tries to clean his wounds.
- whenever: I wince whenever I see those huge diesel tractors plow the Stour meadowlands.
Preposition: in
- pain: Once again, following a brief period of wincing in pain, the South player was able to carry on with the match.
- sympathy: He'd probably been about to burst, she realized as she recorded the volume on his chart and winced in sympathy.
Preposition: for
- moment: He winces visibly for a moment, and then it is done.
Browse dictionary entries near wince
- winceyette
- winch
- Winchester
- Winckelmann
- wind
- wind-borne
- wind-broken
- wind cone
- wind farm
- wind gap
