tingle

From Middle English tinglen, a variant of tinclen (“to tinkle”). More at tinkle.

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɪŋɡəl/

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• Rhymes: -ɪŋɡəl

tingle (third-person singular simple present tingles, present participle tingling, simple past and past participle tingled)

1. (intransitive) To feel a prickling or mildly stinging sensation.

   My hands were tingling from the cold.

   I got hit in the butt yesterday, and it still tingles.

   • 1913, Eleanor H. Porter, chapter 8, in Pollyanna‎, L.C. Page, →OCLC:

     For five minutes Pollyanna worked swiftly, deftly, combing a refractory curl into fluffiness, perking up a drooping ruffle at the neck, or shaking a pillow into plumpness so that the head might have a better pose. Meanwhile the sick woman, frowning prodigiously, and openly scoffing at the whole procedure, was, in spite of herself, beginning to tingle with a feeling perilously near to excitement.

2. (transitive) To cause to feel a prickling or mildly stinging sensation.

   Tingle your tastebuds with these exotic dishes.

3. (intransitive) To ring, to tinkle.
4. (transitive) To cause to ring, to tinkle.
   • 1876, Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the Snark […] , London: Macmillan, Fit the Second.⁠ The Bellman's Speech:

     […] the Captain they trusted so well
     Had only one notion for crossing the ocean,
     And that was to tingle his bell.

5. (intransitive) To make ringing sounds; to twang.
   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 13”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

     Sideways leaning, we sideways darted; every ropeyarn tingling like a wire; the two tall masts buckling like Indian canes in land tornadoes.

   • 1859-1895, Charles Dickens, All the Year Round

     sharp tingling bells

• (to feel a prickly sensation): itch
• (to ring, cause to ring): tinkle

• tingly

tingle (plural tingles)

1. A prickling or mildly stinging sensation.

• Etling, elting, linget, niglet