What does "rat-baiting" mean?

A blood sport involving the setting of dogs upon rats in a rat pit.

What is a synonym for "rat-baiting"?

Common synonyms include: ratting.

Rat-baiting

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1
A blood sport involving the setting of dogs upon rats in a rat pit. countable, uncountable
"His sporting enthusiasms had already embraced yachting, coaching, fencing, and spectatorship at boxing-matches, cock-fights, dog-fights, and rat-baitings."

Synonyms

All synonyms

ratting

Example

More examples

"His sporting enthusiasms had already embraced yachting, coaching, fencing, and spectatorship at boxing-matches, cock-fights, dog-fights, and rat-baitings."

Etymology

From rat + baiting.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.