Dictionary

flense en · VERB

Pronunciation

• /ˈflɛns/
• (Southern-England) audio
• [ˈfl̥ɪ̟ns] Southern US, Appalachia, African-American Vernacular
• /ˈflɪns/ Southern US, Appalachia, African-American Vernacular
• [ˈfl̥ɛns]

Etymology

Borrowed from Danish flense (now spelled flænse).

Meanings

1. To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc.
   • In this domain right sex is capital, it flenses the feelings of all the poisonous artifices brought in by the think-box in the guise of clever ideas. 1974, Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 198:
   • His eyes sprang open. Umegat stared straight at him for the fraction of a second, and Cazaril felt flensed. 2001, Lois McMaster Bujold, The Curse of Chalion, →ISBN, page 191:
   • For that reason, among others, he would never evince the particular guantness, the cut and flagrant sense of purpose - all compromise and capacity for surrender flensed away - which had made Thomas Covenant ir-refusable to her. 2004, Stephen R. Donaldson, The Runes of the Earth, →ISBN, page 5:
   • The Lemakot in the north strangled widows and threw them into the cremation pyres of their dead husbands. If they defeated potential invaders the New Irish hanged the vanquished from banyan trees, flensed their windpipes, removed their heads, left their intestines to jerk in the sun. 2011, Dominic Smith, Bright and Distant Shores, page 106:
   • It engulfed screaming soldiers who disappeared before his eyes, their flesh, armor, even bone, flensed into a suspended mist that was heading straight for them. 2008, Ian C. Esselemont, Return of the Crimson Guard, →ISBN, page 569:

Forms

Synonyms

fleece · flay · skin

Translations (12)

nds-de flinsen (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · fi nylkeä (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · hy մաշկել (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · sv flänsa (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · da flænse (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · ru сдирать (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · hy մորթել (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · nb flense (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · nn flense (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · kl pilappoq (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · de flensen (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc) · hy քերթել (To strip the blubber or skin from, as from a whale, seal, etc)