[f. CRAM v. + -ING1.] The action of the verb CRAM.
1. Stuffing over-full, over-feeding, etc.
1598. Florio, Sagginatione, a pampring, a cramming, or feeding fat.
1616. Surfl. & Markh., Country Farme, 558. The best food … for the cramming of all sorts of poultrie.
1726. Leoni, Alberti’s Archit., I. 44 b. The filling up or cramming of the middle of the Wall.
1768–74. Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1852), II. 618. People by frequent cramming stretch their stomach beyond its natural tone.
2. colloq. The imparting or acquiring of the knowledge of a subject hastily and for an occasion.
1821. Southey, Lett. (1856), III. 247. It will be better not for him to stand out for College next year, because it will require cramming.
1860. Sat. Rev., IX. 308/1. Without a sort of preliminary cramming, no one could have depicted the peculiarities of an attorney’s office.
1866. Carlyle, Inaug. Address, 172. There is also a process called cramming, in some Universities—that is, getting up such points of things as the examiner is likely to put questions about.
attrib. 1830. Southey, Lett. (1856), IV. 178. A paralytic stroke (probably caused by the cramming system) withered him a few years after.
1886. W. Graham, Soc. Problem, 165. There are more large schools and cramming institutions.
