Revised as of
15 Dec 2022
When the character stepped on the wrong wrung, I, well, my eyes rolled. Again. My ophthalmologist says I gotta stop doing that; I’ll have wrung my eyes out before I’m 105 if I keep on with it.
Well, you’d have rung my chimes iffen you could’ve wrung a ladder. I’d’a said no way, no how. Oh, well, maybe you can. I don’t see why you’d want to. I mean, if that ladder was so pliable that you could have wrung a ladder, I can’t imagine it was all that stable to go up on in the first place.
Now if the character had stepped on the wrong rung, that’d make more sense.
You may want to peek in at “Ringer versus Wringer“. . . just for the ring of it.
Word Confusions . . .
. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.
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| Rung | Wrung |
|---|---|
Leiter Steineberg is SOIR’s own work under the GFDL or CC BY-SA 3.0 license, via Wikimedia Commons. — Those are a lot of rungs to climb! |
Children Wring Water From Clothes They Washed in a Pool at Noskagita Orphanage Daycare by SSG Theanne Tangen is in the public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. — I reckon the kids have those clothes all wrung out by now. |
| Part of Grammar: | |
| It’s the noun that’s important here.
Noun 1; Verb 2, intransitive & transitive Plural for the [focus] noun: rungs Third person present verb: rings |
Morpheme: wring
Verb, transitive Third person present verb: wrings |
| Noun: A horizontal support on a ladder for a person’s foot 1
A strengthening crosspiece in the structure of a chair Verb, intransitive:
[ring with/to; of a place] Resound or reverberate with (a sound or sounds)
[Chiefly British] Call by telephone Verb, transitive: Sound the hour, a peal, etc., on a bell or bells [Chiefly British] Call by telephone |
Squeeze and twist something to force liquid from it
|
| Examples: | |
| Noun: Be careful, honey, there’s a loose rung on that ladder. We must ensure that the unskilled do not get trapped on the bottom rung. I watched a program in which an artisan created, by hand, the rungs for a ladder. Johnny, I’ve told you not to stand on that rung. Now you’ve broken it. Verb, intransitive: A church bell had rung loudly. The phone had rung again, even as I replaced it. Ruth, have you rung for some tea? The room had rung with laughter only hours ago. My eardrums had rung with all the yelling going on. It was a clever retort which had rung with contempt. The author’s honesty had rung true. I had rung several times, but the lines to Moscow were engaged. Verb, transitive: The bells had rung the hour, and I was late again. I had rung her just this morning. Harriet had rung Dorothy up the previous day. |
She had wrung the cloth out in the sink.
I wrung out the excess water from my bathing suit and hung it up to dry. Have you wrung that chicken’s neck, yet? She was so scared that she wrung my hand into pulp. A few concessions were wrung from the government. The letter must have wrung her heart. |
| Derivatives: | |
| Adjective: runged, rungless | Noun: wringing |
| History of the Word: | |
|
The verb form of the Old English wringan is related to the Dutch wringen. |
C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!
Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.
Resources for Rung versus Wrung
Apple Dictionary.com
Pinterest Photo Credits
Jacob’s Ladder, <https://visualhunt.com/f2/photo/5007786786/ab5c8c7dfc/>, by fdecomite, <https://visualhunt.com/author/b7c1fc>, is under the CC BY license, via VisualHunt. A Scottish Washing, 1909, is by an unknown author and courtesy of Curt Teich Postcard Archives Digital Collection (Newberry Library) in the public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
