[f. WRENCH v. + -ING1.]
1. The action of the verb in various senses; an instance of this.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., V. xxviii. (Addit. MS.). Þe hond is greued … by wrastinge and wrenching of ioyntes.
c. 1400. Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 5 (Addit. MS.). Þe secunde techynge a comyn word off wrenchynges out of Ioynte.
1545. Ascham, Toxoph. (Arb.), 145. An other maketh a wrynchinge with hys backe.
1580. Blundevil, Horsemanship, 51 b. Of the wrinching of the shoulder.
1674. Barbette’s Chirurg. (ed. 2), 17. Sometimes the Bone is … forced out of its place … but a little, or half, which is called Sub-luxation, or Wrenching.
1733. Tull, Horse-Hoeing Husb., xxii. 338. By the Twisting (or Renching) of the Wheels.
1821. Byron, Two Foscari, I. i. 160. My curdling limbs Quiver with the anticipated wrenching.
1861. Dickens, All Year Round, 13 July, 365. The sudden wrenching of him out of our boat.
1884. E. Yates, Recoll., I. 159. The charioteers … declined to submit them to the unavoidable twists and wrenchings.
fig. 1555. Latimer, in Foxe, A. & M. (1583), 1724/2. Their racking, writhing, wrinching, and monstrously iniuryng of Gods holy scripture.
1583. Melbancke, Philotimus, Cc iij. Whose loue hath eased the wrenching of my heart.
1863. Cowden Clarke, Shaks. Char., xvi. 391. No tyranny being equal to the wrenching of law for penal purposes.
b. spec. The action of rectifying a deformed foot, esp. by a foot-wrench.
1896. Tubby, Deformities, 415. Wrenching … may be effected more especially in this degree by manual force, and in the severer degrees by special apparatus. Ibid. When wrenching is carried out with the hands.
† 2. A griping pain in the bowels. Obs.
1607. Walkington, Opt. Glass, 124. Vexed much with wrinching and griping in the bowels.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 442. The wringings and wrinchings … in the guts or belly of a man or woman.
† 3. attrib. in wrenching-iron.
1592. Shaks., Rom. & Jul., V. iii. 22. Giue me that Mattocke, & the wrenching Iron.
1769. Public Advertiser, 6 June, 3/2. The Thieves left behind them a Wrenching Iron, about two Feet long.
