[f. BITE v. + -ING2.]
1. That bites (in the various senses of the vb.).
a. 1300. Cursor M., 5954. Hungre flees, sare bitand.
1483. Cath. Angl., 33. Bytynge, mordens, mordax.
1607. Hieron, Wks., I. 234. A sharpe axe, which hath a byting edge.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 445. It hath very sharp teeth, and is a very biting Beast.
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., 114. The bitingest and tightest screw in London.
2. That causes pain or smart; keen, pungent.
1340. Ayenb., 143. Þet zed o mostard is wel smal … hit is wel strang and wel bitinde.
1552. Huloet, Bytynge … as gynger or Peper.
1579. E. K., in Spenser’s Sheph. Cal., Feb., 231. The byting frost nipt his stalke dead.
1802. Southey, Thalaba, X. vi. Louder grows the biting wind.
1843. Dickens, Christm. Carol, i. 12. It was cold, bleak, biting weather.
b. In names of plants: Acrid, hot, pungent.
1597. Gerard, Herbal, II. cccxxvii. 890. White Clematis or Biting Periwinkle.
1861. Miss Pratt, Flower. Pl., II. 324. The Biting Stonecrop.
3. That wounds the mind or feelings; stinging, caustic; bitter, painful.
c. 1374. Chaucer, Boeth., III. vii. 79. Of whiche children how bitynge is euery condicioun.
c. 1400. Apol. Loll., 105. Þei are … glosandist flaterars & bitandist bacbitars.
1598. Shaks., Merry W., V. v. 178. To repay that money will be a biting affliction.
1611. Rich, Honest. Age (1844), 29. They will say wee are too bitter, too byting, too satiricall.
1711. Swift, Lett. (1767), III. 187. I writ him lately a biting letter.
1749. Fielding, Tom Jones, I. xiii. So biting a calamity.
1868. Freeman, Norm. Conq. (1876), II. vii. 129. Full of the insolent and biting wit of their nation.
1872. Black, Adv. Phaeton, xii. 171. Casting about for some biting epigram.
