prickle
part of speech
noun (a prickle, prickles); verb (prickle, prickles, prickled, prickling)
meaning for a pupil
1) A small sharp point on a plant or animal, like on a hedgehog, holly leaf or bramble. tree →
2) A tingling or stinging feeling on your skin. tree →
3) (verb) To give a stinging, tingling feeling: «The wool prickled my neck.» tree →
4) (verb) When your skin or the back of your neck prickles, you feel fear or excitement. tree →
sense in the lessons
In science, prickles and spines protect plants and animals: a hedgehog rolls up and shows its prickles. In stories, «the hairs on the back of her neck prickled» tells the reader the character senses danger. Phrases: «a prickle of fear», «prickle with tears» (eyes stinging before crying).
examples
- The hedgehog's prickles kept the fox away. tree →
- My new jumper prickles. tree →
- I felt a prickle of fear when the door creaked. tree →
- Watch out for the prickles on the rose stem. tree →
- Her eyes prickled with tears. tree →
- Mole felt the back of his neck prickle in the Wild Wood. tree →
- Holly leaves have prickles on their edges. tree →
- But one of the tree’s prickles pierced his finger and caused great pain and inflammation, so that the young Prince fell down in a fainting fit. tree →
note
Prickly is the adjective: «a prickly cactus», «a prickly person» (easily annoyed). Strictly, botanists say prickles grow on the skin of a stem (rose), while thorns and spines are changed branches or leaves, but in everyday talk they are mixed.
In the corpora
- His paw fills with prickles, and Hedgehog flies off into the dark bushes.
- Hedgehog says «scales are a tremendous improvement on prickles».
- Jaguar tells his Mother that the two «have gone shares in their prickles», because both are scaly all over.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «prickle» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.