noun, verb ·2 syllables ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A chip or shaving whittled from some larger substance. plural-normally
2. 2
   The art of carving shapes out of raw wood using a knife.
3. 3
   A process of repeatedly shaving slivers from a piece of wood (non-artistic).
4. 4
   The reducing of something by degrees, especially at the expense of some effort. broadly, figuratively

   "a whittling down"

Verb

1. 1
   present participle and gerund of whittle form-of, gerund, participle, present

Synonyms

All synonyms

anaglypticsanaglyptographyarchitectural sculpturebone-carvingcastingceroplastics

Example

More examples

"Tom took out his knife and started whittling a piece of wood."

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