hiding

Pluralhidings (some meanings)

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of hide.

   He was hiding in the attic until the storm finally passed.

   Hiding the truth only made the situation worse later on.

   Note

   One spelling covers two separate verbs: the hide that conceals, and the hide that means to beat with a whip made from hide. As a participle it builds progressives (was hiding in the attic). As a gerund it behaves like a noun (hiding the truth). The concealing verb works with an object (hiding the keys) or without one, when the person hides themselves (hiding from the storm).

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The state or condition of being concealed from view.

   The witness remained in hiding until the trial was over.

   Months of hiding had left the dissident exhausted and isolated.

   Similarconcealment, seclusion

   Note

   This is the hiding someone is in, not somewhere they go. It is usually uncountable and almost always follows in: a person stays or remains in hiding, as a celebrity might for a few weeks after a scandal. Unlike the place of concealment, it takes no article and no plural. You speak of a condition someone is in, not a spot they occupy.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   A place in which a person or thing can be concealed.

   The children each had a favorite hiding in the overgrown garden.

   Smugglers built clever hidings into the false floor of the cart.

   Similarhideout, hideaway, refuge, cache

4. 4
   nouncolloquialfigurativelycountable

   A beating or spanking, especially one delivered as punishment.

   The bully promised the new kid a hiding after school.

   Our side handed the visitors a thorough hiding on the field.

   Similarbeating, thrashing, spanking, drubbing, hammering

   Note

   The word comes with an article and a verb of giving or receiving: someone gets a hiding, or promises one, and intensifiers are common, as in a good hiding or a thorough hiding. The picture behind it is skin being worked over. It sits close to the verb hide in its sense of beating with a whip made from hide. Its colloquial tone makes it at home in threats and banter.

5. 5
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The removal of an animal's skin so that its hide can be put to human use.

   The hiding of the deer was done at the edge of the camp.

   Proper hiding preserves the pelt intact for the leatherworkers.

   Similarskinning, flaying

   Note

   Nothing to do with concealment: this hiding comes from the word's second origin, hide meaning an animal's skin. It names the literal work of taking that skin off so it can be used. The colloquial beating stands on this literal ground and uses the image figuratively. Where both senses are possible, context alone tells a reader whether a hiding means skinning or punishment.

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