thumping

comparative more thumping · superlative most thumping

1. informalExceptional in some degree.

comparative more thumping · superlative most thumping

1. informalExceptionally. Very.

   A thumping good wizard you'll be, I'm sure.

plural thumpings

1. countableuncountableA dull, heavy sound.

   There was nothing to be seen, but he could hear loud thumpings and bumpings which seemed to come from the back of the house.

   1941, Gladys Mitchell, When Last I Died

   1 more example

   They were a regular series of thumpings from the interior of the house, occasioned by the violent rocking of a cradle upon a stone floor, to which movement a feminine voice kept time by singing, in a vigorous gallopade[.]

   1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 28

2. countableuncountableA beating.

   He received a thumping from the school bully.

   1 more example

   And in our times, in Philadelphia, there have been specimens of violent shruggings of the shoulders, and brachial twitches, and prodigious wry faces, and thumpings on the pews.

   1824, William Craig Brownlee, A careful and free inquiry into the true nature and tendency of the religious principles of the Society of Friends, commonly called Quakers

3. countableuncountablehobbiesA heavy defeat.

   Grant's future has been the subject of rumour after rumour for much of the season and last week's horrific 5-0 thumping at Newcastle was the catalyst for another round of fevered speculation.

   2011 January 11, Jonathan Stevenson, “West Ham 2 - 1 Birmingham”, in BBC

   Synonyms: thrashing

1. gerundparticiplepresentpresent participle and gerund of thump