different between trenchant vs stinging

English

Alternative forms

• trenchaunt (obsolete)

Etymology

Borrowed into Middle English from Old French trenchant, the present participle of trenchier (“to cut”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?t??n??nt/

Adjective

trenchant (comparative more trenchant, superlative most trenchant)

1. (obsolete) Fitted to trench or cut; gutting; sharp.
   • 1663, Samuel Butler, Hudibras, part 1, canto 1:

     The trenchant blade, Toledo trusty, / For want of fighting was grown rusty, / And ate into itself, for lack / Of somebody to hew and hack.

2. (figuratively) Keen; biting; vigorously articulate and effective; severe.
   • 2011, Jay A. Gertzman, Bookleggers and Smuthounds: The Trade in Erotica, 1920-1940

     His trenchant criticisms of the Church's repression […] include a discussion of the considerable 1938 success of the fledgling NODL in getting magazines removed from various points of sale.

Translations

Middle French

Etymology

Old French trenchant.

Noun

trenchant m or f (plural trenchans)

1. sharp

Descendants

• French: tranchant

Old French

Adjective

trenchant m (oblique and nominative feminine singular trenchant or trenchante)

1. sharp; razor sharp

Declension

Verb

trenchant

1. present participle of trenchier

English

Etymology

From Middle English styngyng; equivalent to sting +? -ing.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?st????/
• Rhymes: -????

Adjective

stinging (comparative more stinging, superlative most stinging)

1. Having the capacity to sting.

   stinging nettles

2. (figuratively) Precise and hurtful
   • 2017 September 27, David Browne, "Hugh Hefner, 'Playboy' Founder, Dead at 91," Rolling Stone

     That same year, a young Gloria Steinem went undercover as a Playboy Bunny at one of his Playboy Clubs and wrote a stinging inside critique of the magazine's ethos and chauvinism in an article, titled "A Bunny's Tale," which was published in Show magazine.

Derived terms

• stingingly

Verb

stinging

1. present participle of sting

Noun

stinging (plural stingings)

1. The act by which someone receives a sting.

   the stingings of scorpions

   stingings of remorse