Definition of "bellying" in English

verb

1. present participle and gerund of belly

adjective

1. Bulging or billowing.

noun

1. A bulging, swelling or billowing shape; the act or state of bulging, swelling or billowing.

   • 1693, Simon de la Loubère, A New Historical Relation of the Kingdom of Siam, translated by A.P., London: Tho. Horne, Part II, Chapter II. Of the Houses of the Siamese, and of their Architecture in Publick Buildings, page 32, But the Principal Ornament of the Pagodes, is to be accompanied, as generally they are, with several Pyramids of Lime and Brick […] Some there are which diminish and grow thick again four or five times in their heighth, so that the Profile of them goes waving: But these Bellyings out are smaller as they are in a higher part of the Pyramid.
   • 1873, Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Sunset,” Diary entry dated 3 November, 1873, in The Dublin Review, July, August, September, 1920, p. 64, A few minutes later the brightness over; one great dull rope coiling overhead sidelong from the sunset, its dewlaps and bellyings painted with a maddery campion-colour that seemed to stoop and drop like sopped cake;