cudgel
English
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cudgel¹
- /ˈkʌd͡ʒəl/
Rhymes with -ʌdʒəl
Where it comes from
From Middle English kuggel, from Old English cyċġel (“a large stick, cudgel”), from Proto-West Germanic *kuggil, from Proto-Germanic *kuggilaz (“a knobbed instrument”), derivative of Proto-Germanic *kuggǭ (“cog, swelling”), from Proto-Indo-European *gewgʰ- (“swelling, bow”), from Proto-Indo-European *gew- (“to bow, bend, arch, curve”), equivalent to cog + -el (diminutive suffix). Cognate with Middle Dutch coghele (“a stick with a rounded end”).
noun cudgels
- A short heavy club with a rounded head used as a weapon. The guard hefted his cudgel menacingly and looked at the inmates.
- Anything that can be used as a threat to force one's will on another. As above said, legibility depends also much on the design of the letter; and again I take up the cudgels against compressed type, and that especially in Roman letters: […]
verb cudgels · cudgeling · cudgelling · cudgeled · cudgelled
- To strike with a cudgel. The officer was violently cudgeled down in the midst of the rioters.
- To exercise (one's wits or brains) in an effort to force a memory or solution; to rack (one's mind). “Most remarkable,” murmured Tarzan, cudgeling his brain for some pretext upon which to turn the subject.
Cudgel²
proper noun
- A locality in the Leeton council area, southern New South Wales, Australia.
Translations
Talk about this word "cudgel." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/cudgel. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. cudgel. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/cudgel "cudgel." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/cudgel.Cite this
@misc{cudgel_2026,
title = {cudgel},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/cudgel},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
