perishing

perishing

English

Adjective

perishing (comparative more perishing, superlative most perishing)

1. Extremely cold.
   • 2002 February 23, The Guardian,, “Andy Wilson at Headingly”, in The Guardian‎:

     Leeds avoided a potential banana skin on a perishing night to claim the first place in the last eight of the Kellogg's Challenge Cup with a high-class performance by their new Australian stand-off Ben Walker

2. Extreme; used of environmental or bodily conditions.
   • 1946, Frank W. C. Rieck, Life as I See It (page 308)

     If many more white men knew of this method of obtaining and extracting water, there would be, perhaps, many saved from the horrors of perishing thirst.

   • 2011, Mary Groves, An Outback Life (page 102)

     A boulder ground into Joe's thigh and he yelled for what seemed an eternity in the perishing heat but, apart from a few bird calls, the horse's laboured breath was the only sound he heard.

Verb

perishing

1. present participle of perish

Noun

perishing (plural perishings)

1. The act of something that perishes; decay or destruction.
   • 1971, William Barrett, ‎Henry David Aiken, Pragmatism and America's philosophical coming of age (page 323)

     Since the world of becoming, of origins and perishings, is deficient in true Being, it cannot be known in the best sense.