Forms: 6 twynge, twynche, 7 twindge, (twing), 7– twinge. [f. TWINGE v.1]
† 1. An act of tweaking or pinching; a tweak or pinch. Also fig. Obs.
1548. Udall, Erasm. Par. Luke, Prol. 15. Nipped my hert also with a litell twynge.
c. 1550. Pryde & Abuse Women, 200, in Hazl., E. P. P., IV. 243. Rubbe a galde horse on thee backe, And he wyll kicke and wynse; And so wyll wanton wylyons When they have anye snaper or twynche.
1611. Cotgr., Strette, a pinch, nip, wrinche, twindge. Ibid., Tire, a … ierke, twang, twing.
a. 1625. Fletcher, Nice Valour, III. ii. For the twindge by th’ nose, ’Tis certainly unsightly.
1692. R. L’Estrange, Fables, ccxciii. I. 255. I wonder … how you can Fawn thus upon a Master that gives you so many Blows, and Twinges by the Ears.
[1869. Browning, Ring & Bk., IX. 146. Gently thou joggest by a twinge the wit.]
2. A sharp pinching or wringing pain; often, a momentary local pain; esp. applied to that of gout and rheumatism.
1608. Middleton, Mad World, II. vii. You feel as it were a twinge?
1639. in Verney Mem. (1907), I. 220. Crewell twinges [of gout].
1787. Wolcott (P. Pindar), Instr. Laureat, Wks. 1812, I. 497. They’ve felt a pain in all their Toes And often at the twinges started.
1824. Lady Granville, Lett., 21 March (1894), I. 267. Your … letter … soothed and comforted me during my sharpest twinges [of toothache].
1827. Edin. Weekly Jrnl., 28 Feb. I can agree with Lord Ogleby as to his rheumatism, and say, ‘There’s a twinge.’
1831. Brewster, Nat. Magic, iii. (1833), 48. The account of any person having suffered severe pain … produces acute twinges of pain in the corresponding parts of her person.
a. 1839. Praed, Poems (1864), II. 77. When the twinge comes shooting through you.
1863. Geo. Eliot, Romola, vii. The gout … gave him such severe twinges.
1880. L. Stephen, Pope, iv. 88. Philosophers capable of rheumatic twinges.
b. transf. A ‘nip’ of cold, etc.
1888. E. Gerard, Land beyond Forest, lv. 360. Alternate twinges of cold and heat.
3. fig. A sharp mental pain; a pang of shame, remorse, sorrow, or the like; a prick of conscience; in quot. a. 1745, a stimulating prick.
1622. Mabbe, trans. Aleman’s Guzman d’Alf., I. 19. Her feigned pangs cease[d], and those truer ones of loue beganne to manifest themselues, giuing other kinde of twinges.
1681. Dryden, Spanish Fryar, IV. i. The Wickedness of this old Villain … gives me a twinge for my own Sin.
a. 1745. Swift, Serm., viii. Wks. 1841, II. 157/2. The poorer sort … have no twinges of ambition.
1780. Cowper, Table Talk, 425. Conscience will have twinges now and then.
1800. Weems, Washington, xv. (1877), 223. This could not save poor Jack from the twinges of envy.
1834. L. Ritchie, Wand. by Seine, 168. The sudden clang of a church-bell arrests us, like a twinge of remorse.
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxf., viii. (1889), 69. It cost the Vicar some twinges of conscience to persuade him.
1874. L. Stephen, Hours in Library (1892), II. iii. 91. Burke’s politics gave him some severe twinges.
4. A twist, a turn. lit. and fig. rare.
1860. Holland, Miss Gilbert, ii. 38. ‘Easy!’ exclaimed Arthur, a half-contemptuous twinge in his lip.
1875. J. Morison in Expositor, I. 124. Grotius gave the expression a most unnatural twinge.
5. dial. An earwig.
1790. Grose, Provinc. Gloss. (ed. 2), Twinge, or Twitch, an earwig. North.
1828. Craven Gloss.
1863. Mrs. Toogood, Yorks. Dial. (MS.).
