Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Creeping |
CreepingAdjective1. Moving or progressing very slowly or laboriously especially by or as if by dragging the body along close to the ground; "a riverbank full of crawling crocodiles"; "a creeping tractor". Noun1. A slow creeping mode of locomotion (on hands and knees or dragging the body); "a crawl was all that the injured man could manage"; "the traffic moved at a creep". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "creeping" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1350. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Building & Civil Engineering | Plastic deformation of a pavement under the continuous action of a load or repeated loading. Source: European Union. (references) |
Electrical Engineering | The undesired running at slow speed of a d. c. motor due to residual magnetism. Source: European Union. (references) |
Mechanical Engineering | Gradual rotation of tyre around wheel. Source: European Union. (references) |
Mining | Eng. The settling or natural subsidence of the surface caused by extensiveunderground mining. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonyms: CreepingSynonyms: crawl (n), crawling (n), creep (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Age | Phrase: "give me a staff of honor for my age"; bis pueri senes; peu de gens savent elre vieux; plenus annis abiit plenus honoribus; "old age is creeping on apace"; "slow-consuming age"'; "the hoary head is a crown of glory"; "the silver livery of advised age"; to grow old gracefully; "to vanish in the chinks that Time has made". |
Animal | Beast, brute, creature, critter, wight, created being; creeping thing, living thing; dumb animal, dumb creature; zoophyte. |
Slowness | Noun: slowness; Adjective: languor; (inactivity); drawl; creeping; Verb:, lentor. |
Adjective: slow, slack; tardy; dilatory; (inactive); gentle, easy; leisurely; deliberate, gradual; insensible, imperceptible; glacial, languid, sluggish, slow paced, tardigrade, snail-like; creeping; Verb: reptatorial. | |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Creeping |
| English words defined with "creeping": creeping bellflower, creeping buttercup, creeping crowfoot, creeping oxalis, creeping St John's wort, creeping wintergreen, creeping wood sorrel. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "creeping": banana problem, Blasphemy ♦ creeping elegance, creeping featuritis, Crusoe ♦ dermamyiasis linearis migrans oestrosa ♦ feature creature, feature creep, feeping creaturism, Flora's Dial ♦ Illumination ♦ KISS Principle ♦ larva migrans, law ♦ moving mine ♦ Numbness ♦ oil slinger, oil thrower, oil thrower ring ♦ serial ♦ unstable slope. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "creeping": Ipecacuanha. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Now old age is creeping up on me. (The Outlaw Josey Wales; writing credit: Forrest Carter; Sonia Chernus) I can smell them creeping up on us. (We Were Soldiers; writing credit: Harold G. Moore; Joseph L. Galloway) You just been creep, creep, creeping around my store for the past weeks (Sister, Sister; writing credit: Leonard Dick; Carrie Honigblum) | |
Lyrics | Time is creeping behind me, surrounding around me (It's About Time; performing artist: LILLIX) Creeping with the girl next door (It Wasn't Me; performing artist: Shaggy) Because a vision softly creeping, (The Sound Of Silence; performing artist: Simon and Garfunkel) | |
Movie/TV Titles | The Creeping Flesh (1973) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
| ||
Theater & Movies | |||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Coastal fog creeping in to Point Sur, about 25 miles south of Carmel. Credit: America's Coastlines. |  | Who said "creeping" socialism?. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
 |
| "Creeping thyme" by Shonna Clark Commentary: "A plant in my rock garden." |
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers. |
| Play | Caption |
 | Very active synthesizer with creeping sounds and synthesized flutes and strings. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Author | Quotation |
Pierre de Beaumarchais | Be commonplace and creeping, and you will be a success. |
Swift | Ambition often puts men upon doing the meanest offices: so climbing is performed in the same posture as creeping. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | He went out by the little Rue Mondetour, creeping along by the houses |
Grapes of Wrath | Steinbeck, John | He heard the high soft laughter of a night hawk and the stealthy movement of a creeping animal in the stubble |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | This is referred to as a creeping eruption or cutaneous larva migrans. (references) | |
Restless legs syndrome (RLS) causes a person to experience unpleasant sensations in the legs, often described as creeping, crawling, pulling, or painful. (references) | ||
They also can display a number of psychotic features, including paranoia, auditory hallucinations, mood disturbances, and delusions (for example, the sensation of insects creeping on the skin, called "formication"). (references) | ||
Economic History | Israel | Inflation, though under control, is creeping up from zero last year. (references) |
Zimbabwe | The government's action to informally cap the exchange rate of the Zimbabwe dollar in January 1999 (effectively halting devaluation) has raised concern about creeping government control and a return to the centrally controlled economy of the 1980s. Revised banking regulations have been criticized for reducing the independence of the central bank in carrying out its monetary policies. (references) | |
Lexicography | Devil's Dictionary | SERIAL, n. A literary work, usually a story that is not true, creeping through several issues of a newspaper or magazine. Frequently appended to each installment is a "synposis of preceding chapters" for those who have not read them, but a direr need is a synposis of succeeding chapters for those who do not intend to read them. A synposis of the entire work would be still better. The late James F. Bowman was writing a serial tale for a weekly paper in collaboration with a genius whose name has not come down to us. They wrote, not jointly but alternately, Bowman supplying the installment for one week, his friend for the next, and so on, world without end, they hoped. Unfortunately they quarreled, and one Monday morning when Bowman read the paper to prepare himself for his task, he found his work cut out for him in a way to surprise and pain him. His collaborator had embarked every character of the narrative on a ship and sunk them all in the deepest part of the Atlantic. |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Creeping" is generally used as a lexical verb (-ing form) -- approximately 88.21% of the time. "Creeping" is used about 407 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Lexical Verb (-ing form) | 88.21% | 359 | 15,003 |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 9.83% | 40 | 54,274 |
| Noun (proper) | 0.98% | 4 | 175,879 |
| Noun (singular) | 0.98% | 4 | 175,879 |
| Total | 100.00% | 407 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "creeping": creeping barrage ♦ creeping bellflower ♦ creeping bent ♦ creeping bentgrass ♦ creeping bugle ♦ creeping buttercup ♦ Creeping Charlie ♦ creeping crowfoot ♦ creeping elegance ♦ creeping eruption ♦ creeping featurism ♦ creeping featuritis ♦ creeping fern ♦ creeping Jenny ♦ creeping juniper ♦ creeping lily ♦ creeping line search ♦ creeping mine ♦ creeping of the skin ♦ creeping oxalis ♦ Creeping oxeye ♦ creeping plant ♦ creeping rot ♦ Creeping snowberry ♦ creeping soft grass ♦ creeping spike rush ♦ creeping St John's wort ♦ creeping thing ♦ creeping things ♦ creeping thistle ♦ creeping thyme ♦ Creeping warbler ♦ creeping willow ♦ creeping windmill grass ♦ creeping wintergreen ♦ creeping wood sorrel ♦ creeping zinnia. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "creeping": Creeping-jesus. | |
Ending with "creeping": far-creeping. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "creeping"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | zvarritje (crawl, crawling, creep, dragging, lugging, procrastination, scuff, spreading, trailing), servil (bootlicker, crawler, fawning, obsequious, servile, subservient, sycophantic, toad-eater, toad-eating, toady), që zvarrit, kacavjerrës (creepy), i ngadaltë (deliberate, dilatory, lingering, long, slack, slow, sluggish). (various references) | |
Arabic | تعرش (ramble, scramble), زحف (crawl, crawl on all fours, crawling, creep, draggle, grovel, march, scramble, trail), دب (bear, crawl). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | неусетно идващ, бавно настъпващ, бавен (deliberate, dense, dilatory, languid, leaden, leisurely, lingering, long, lumpish, pernickety, plodding, slack, slow, sluggish, stagnant, stopping, tardigrade, tardy, unready), пълзящ (procumbent, prostrate, rambling, repent, reptile, running, scandent, serpigious), подъл (base, blackguardly, caitiff, dastardly, devilish, diabolic, diabolical, dirt, dirty, dishonorable, dishonourable, jesuitic, jesuitical, low, low down, low-minded, mean, mean-spirited, miscreant, recreant, reptile, scurvy, shabby, snaky, sneaking, sneaky, snide, vile, villainous). (various references) | |
Chinese | 爬行 (Crawl, Crawled, Crawling, creeps, Crept, scramble, scrambled). (various references) | |
Czech | progresivní (go ahead, progressive), plíživý (sneaking). (various references) | |
Danish | plastisk deformation (flow, inelastic deformation, irreversible deformation, permanent deformation, permanent set, permanent set yielding, plastic deformation, pushing, residual deformation, set, set yielding), krybning (cissing, cold flow, crawling, creep, creep erosion, flow). (various references) | |
Dutch | uitvloeien (spreading), uitlopen (come to an end, drive away, drive off, end, end up, exit, expire, go out), kruipend, kruipen (crawl, creep), kruip (cold flow, creep, flow, pushing). (various references) | |
Finnish | remanenssiryömintä. (various references) | |
French | trainant, retard de réponse, rampant (crawling, creeper), rampage (crawling), grimpant (creeper), glissant, fluage (creep, creep deformation), déplacement intempestif, étalement. (various references) | |
German | schleichend (insidious, lingering, skulking, slinking, sneaking, sneaky, tiptoeing, weaseling), kriechend (crawling, cringing, groveling, slow moving, truckling, worming). (various references) | |
Greek | μαγνητικό σύρσιμο, πλαστική ροή (flow, pushing), που απλωνεται σιγά-σιγά, ερπυσμός μετάλλου, ερπυσμός (cissing, crawling, creep, flow, pushing). (various references) | |
Hebrew | זחילה (crawl, slowpoke, sluggishness), רמישה (crawling), רחישה (moving, stir, swarming, trembling). (various references) | |
Hungarian | csúszómászó (abject, crawler, groveller, repent, reptant, reptile, reptilian, snake, sneaky, spaniel, sycophantic), kúszó (climber, climbing, creepy, repent, reptant). (various references) | |
Indonesian | jalar. (various references) | |
Italian | strisciante (cringing, groveling, grovelling, reptant, unctuous), scorrimento (creep, creep deformation, float, float time, flow, ground water flow, percolation, plastic deformation, plastic flow, pushing, runoff, seepage, shift, slack, sliding, slip, slipping), rotazione lenta per magnetismo residuo, rampicante (clambering, climber, climbing, rambling, reptant, scrambling, voluble). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 這い這い (crawling), 匍匐 (crawling, sneaking). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | ほふく (crawling, sneaking), はいはい (crawling). (various references) | |
Korean | 김. (various references) | |
Manx | snaue (bathing, course, crawl, crawling, creep, creep as child, float, floating, flotation, glide, gliding, in suspension, scuttle; track of snail; swimming, scuttle; track; swimming, sidle, slither, slithering, swim). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | eepingcray.(various references) | |
Portuguese | rastejante (creepy, repent, reptile), deslocação brusca, arrasto (drag, dragging), adulador (adulatory, fawning, flatterer, flunkey, groveller, lackey, lacquey, mealy-mouthed, obsequious, smarmy, smooth-spoken, smooth-tongued, sugary, toad-eater, toad-eating, toady, truckler, tuft-hunter, unctuous). (various references) | |
Romanian | târâtor (crawling, creepy, cringing, decumbent, grovelling, prostrate, reptile). (various references) | |
Russian | угодливый (adulatory, obsequious, officious, supple), расслабленный (emasculate), раболепствующий, раболепный (creepy, fawning, menial, obsequious, servile, subservient), медленный (dilatory, long, slow, slow-acting, sluggish, tardy, unhurried), пресмыкающийся (repent), ползучий (repent), ползающий (creepy), ползать ползучий. (various references) | |
Scottish | snàgan (a creeping or slow motion), snàgail (nf. creeping slow motion), màgaran (creeping on all fours), euladh (creeping away), èaladh, euladh (a creeping along). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | od kog' podilaze žmarci. (various references) | |
Spanish | progresivo (forward, onward, progressive, stepwise), fluencia (creep, dose, flow, fluence, particle fluence, pushing, yielding), arrastre (pull). (various references) | |
Swedish | plastisk deformation (flow, inelastic deformation, irreversible deformation, permanent deformation, permanent set, permanent set yielding, plastic deformation, pushing, residual deformation, set, set yielding), krypning (cissing, crawling, creep, flow, pooping, springing), krypande (crawl, creep, creepy, cringing, decumbent, grovelling, obsequious, procumbent, servile, sycophantic). (various references) | |
Turkish | sarmaşık türünden, sürünen (creepy), emekleyen (creepy), ürpertici (creepy, gory). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | розслаблений (dissolute, enervate), холуйський, повільний (costive, laggard, lagger, lagging, languid, leisurely, lingering, logy, slack, slow, sluggish, snail-paced, sulky), повзучий (creepy, procumbent, repent, wandering), плазуючий (creepy, repent, reptile, wormy). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | reptile, reptili, reptilia, reptilibus, reptilium. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Language | Date | Source | Acts Chapter 10, Verse 12 |
| Greek (transliterated) | 250 BC | Septuagint | En w uphrcen panta ta tetrapoda thV ghV kai ta qhria kai ta erpeta kai ta peteina tou ouranou |
| Latin | 405 | Vulgate | In quo erant omnia quadrupedia et serpentia terrae et volatilia caeli |
| Middle English | 1395 | Wyclif | In which weren alle foure footid beestis, and crepinge of the erthe, and volatilis of heuene. |
| Renaissance English | 1526 | Tyndale | Where in wer all maner of .iiii. foted beastes of the erth and vermen and wormes and foules of the ayer. |
| Jacobean English | 1611 | King James | Wherein were all manner of fourfooted beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air. |
| Victorian English | 1833 | Webster | In which were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping animals, and fowls of the air. |
| Basic English | 1964 | Ogden | In which were all sorts of beasts and birds. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Language | Acts Chapter 10, Verse 12 |
| Albanian | dhe brenda tij ishin të gjitha llojet e katërkëmbësheve, bisha, zvarranikë të tokës dhe shpendë qielli. |
| Cebuano | Sa sulod niini diha ang tanang matang sa mga mananap nga tagup-at ug tiil ug sa mga nanagsaguyod sa yuta, ug sa mga langgam sa kahanginan. |
| Croatian | U njoj bijahu svakovrsni èetveronošci, gmazovi zemaljski i ptice nebeske. |
| Danish | og i denne var der alle Jordens firføddede Dyr og krybende Dyr og Himmelens Fugle. |
| Dutch | In hetwelk waren al de viervoetige dieren der aarde, en de wilde, en de kruipende dieren, en de vogelen des hemels. |
| Finnish | Ja siinä oli kaikkinaisia maan nelijalkaisia ja matelijoita ja taivaan lintuja. |
| German | Darin waren allerlei vierfüßige Tiere der Erde und wilde Tiere und Gewürm und Vögel des Himmels. |
| Haitian Creole | Te gen tout kalite bèt kat pat, tout kalite bèt ki trennen sou vant ak tout kalite zwezo ladan li. |
| Indonesian-Bahasa Sehari-hari | Di dalamnya terdapat segala macam binatang berkaki empat, segala binatang yang menjalar dan burung-burung liar. |
| Indonesian-Terjemahan Lama | Di dalamnya ada segala jenis binatang yang berkaki empat dan yang melata di bumi, dan burung yang di udara. |
| Italian | In essa c'era ogni sorta di quadrupedi e rettili della terra e uccelli del cielo. |
| Maori | I roto i taua mea nga momo kararehe waewae wha katoa, nga mea ngokingoki katoa o te whenua, me nga manu o te rangi. |
| Norwegian | i den var det alle slags firføtte og krypende dyr som lever på jorden, og alle slags himmelens fugler. |
| Portuguese | no qual havia de todos os quadrúpedes e répteis da terra e aves do céu. |
| Rumanian | Kn ea se aflau tot felul de dobitoace cu patru picioare wi tkrktoare de pe pqmknt wi pqsqrile cerului. |
| Russian | Ч ОЕН ОБИПДЙМЙУШ ЧУСЛЙЕ ЮЕФЧЕТПОПЗЙЕ ЪЕНОЩЕ, ЪЧЕТЙ, РТЕУНЩЛБАЭЙЕУС Й РФЙГЩ ОЕВЕУОЩЕ. |
| Shuar | Nu tarachnium yajasma irunmiayi. Wekainiusha, nanamtincha, tura napisha enkemiarmiayi. |
| Spanish | En el lienzo había toda clase de cuadrúpedos y reptiles de la tierra y aves del cielo. |
| Swahili | Ndani ya shuka hiyo kulikuwa na kila aina ya wanyama: wanyama wenye miguu minne, wanyama watambaao na ndege wa angani. |
| Swedish | Och däri funnos alla slags fyrfota och krälande djur som leva på jorden, och alla slags himmelens fåglar. |
| Uma | Hi rala kumu' to ra'ulu toe, mparanyalaa binata, ria omea: to opo' witi' -na, to menyolo, hante danci wo'o. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Misspellings | |
"Creeping" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: creeling, Creppiny, Crespin, crieing, reeping. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "creeping" (pronounced krē"ping) |
| 5 | -r ē" p i ng | reaping. |
| 4 | -ē" p i ng | beeping, bleeping, heaping, keeping, leaping, peeping, safekeeping, seeping, sleeping, sweeping, weeping. |
| 3 | -p i ng | antidumping, aping, backslapping, bookkeeping, bumping, burping, camping, capping, carping, Chipping, chirping, chomping, chopping, clamping, clapping, clipping, clumping, coping, copping, cramping, crimping, cropping, damping, developing, dipping, draping, dripping, drooping, dropping, dumping, eavesdropping, enveloping, equipping, escaping, flapping, flipping, flopping, galloping, gaping, gasping, gossiping, grasping, griping, gripping, groping, grouping, gulping, handicapping, harping, helping, hoping, hopping, housekeeping, hyping, jumping, kidnaping, kidnapping, lamping, landscaping, lapping, limping, lopping, lumping, mapping, moping, mopping, napping, nipping, outstripping, overlapping, overstepping, peacekeeping, pimping, piping, popping, prepping, propping, pulping, pumping, ramping, raping, rapping, recapping, recouping, regrouping, reshaping, revamping, ripping, romping, roping, sapping, scalping, scooping, scoping, scraping, scrapping, scrimping, shaping, shipping, shopping, sidestepping, sipping, skimping, skipping, slapping, slipping, sloping, slumping, snapping, sniping, snooping, sopping, stamping, stepping, stereotyping, stomping, stooping, stopping, strapping, stripping, stumping, swamping, swapping, swiping, swooping, tamping, taping, tapping, thumping, tipping, topping, tramping, trapping, tripping, trooping, typing, unwrapping, upping, usurping, videotaping, walloping, Wapping, warping, whipping, whooping, whopping, wiping, Wiretapping, worshipping, wrapping, zapping, zipping. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "c-e-e-g-i-n-p-r" | |
-1 letter: creping, generic, peering, preeing. | |
-2 letters: cering, cringe, peeing, piecer, pierce, pincer, pinger, prince, recipe, repine. | |
-3 letters: creep, crepe, cripe, genic, genie, genip, genre, green, gripe, nicer, niece, pence, piece, preen, price, reign, renig, repeg, repin, ripen. | |
-4 letters: cepe, cere, cine, cire, eger, epic, erne, gene, gien, girn, gree, grin, grip, neep, nice, peen, peer. | |
| Words containing the letters "c-e-e-g-i-n-p-r" | |
+1 letter: preceding. | |
+2 letters: compeering, excerpting, perceiving, perfecting, pickeering, precenting, precessing, prelecting, proceeding, receipting, respecting, sceptering. | |
+3 letters: becarpeting, deciphering, deprecating, enciphering, epeirogenic, paragenetic, persecuting, praelecting, prechecking, precleaning, preclearing, precreasing, preelecting, preenacting, preerecting, pregnancies, proceedings, reaccepting, recarpeting, stringpiece, superceding. | |
+4 letters: apperceiving, carpentering, cheeseparing, copresenting, depreciating, experiencing, fingerpicked, intercepting, petrogenetic, precanceling, precensoring, precognitive, predeceasing, prerecording, prescreening, preselecting, recompensing, recuperating, reinspecting, reprocessing, repugnancies, sepulchering, stringpieces. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Images: Digital Art | 9. Sounds 10. Quotations: Familiar 11. Quotations: Fiction 12. Quotations: Non-fiction | 13. Usage Frequency 14. Expressions 15. Expressions: Internet 16. Translations: Modern | 17. Translations: Ancient 18. Bible Trace 19. Derivations 20. Rhymes | 21. Anagrams 22. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
