tinder
pronunciation
How to pronounce tinder in British English:
UK [ˈtɪndə(r)]
How to pronounce tinder in American English:
US [ˈtɪndər]
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- Noun:
- material for starting a fire
Word Origin
- tinder
- tinder: [OE] Tinder, and its relatives German zunder, Dutch tonder, and Swedish tunder, go back to a prehistoric Germanic base *tund- ‘ignite, kindle’, which also produced German anzünden, Swedish upptända, and Danish antænde ‘kindle’. Its ultimate origins are not known. The now clichéd tinder-dry is first recorded in Rudyard Kipling’s Light That Failed 1891: ‘the tinder-dry clumps of scrub’.
- tinder (n.)
- "dry, inflammable substance," Old English tynder, from or related to tendan "to kindle," from Proto-Germanic *tund- "ignite, kindle" (cognates: Gothic tandjan, Swedish tända, German zünden "to kindle").
Example
- 1. The plant is as dry as tinder after this long drought .
- 2. The plants are as dry as tinder after this long drought .
- 3. Cotton socks can also provide you with a source of fire-starting tinder .
- 4. He spunked up like tinder . " Do you call me a liar ? " He said .
- 5. Natural tinder is not easy to obtain unless you know where to look for and is not always easy to light up .