[-ING1.]
1. The action of shrinking timorously, or of bowing or bending the body servilely; servile or obsequious behavior. Often applied contemptuously to bowing.
1634. W. Tirwhyt, trans. Balzac’s Lett., 248. A Country … where all men grow crooked with extreame cringeing.
1660. Milton, Free Commw., 429. Among the perpetual bowing and cringings of an abject People.
1727. A. Hamilton, New Acc. E. Ind., I. xiii. 156. Making some decent Cringings towards the Tomb.
1767. T. Hutchinson, Hist. Mass. Bay, II. 214. His cringing to Randolph … was a spot in his character.
1847. L. Hunt, Jar Honey (1848), 199. The studied cringing so common in Naples is rare here.
2. Muscular contraction, shrinking.
1727–51. Chambers, Cycl., s.v. Amble, Though the amble be gained, it must be slow and unsightly; because attended with a cringing in the hind-parts.
