middling Definition

middle
adj

1. At, or being, a point or position between two others, usually two ends or extremes, and especially the same distance from each.

Example: It's the middle house in the row
Thesaurus: between, midway, medial, equidistant, intermediate.
2. Intermediate; neither at the top or at the bottom end of the scale.

Example: middle management
Example: middle income
Thesaurus: intermediate, average, mean.
3. Moderate, not extreme; taken, used, etc as a compromise.

Example: middle ground
4. Said especially of languages: belonging to a period coming after the Old period and before the Modern.

Example: Middle English
Form: Middle

noun

1. The middle point, part or position of something.

Example: the middle of the night
Thesaurus: centre, heart, inside; mean, middle way, midpoint, halfway point; Antonym: end, border, periphery.
2. colloq
The waist.
Thesaurus: midriff, midsection, waist.

verb middled, middling

1. To place something in the middle.
2. cricket.
To hit (the ball) with the middle of the bat, therefore to hit it firmly and accurately.

Idiom: be in the middle of something

To be busy with it and likely to remain so for some time.

Etymology: Anglo-Saxon middel.

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middling (colloq)
adj

1. Average; moderate; mediocre.

Thesaurus: mediocre, ordinary, average, common, modest, passable, run-of-the-mill, unexceptional, unremarkable.

adverb

1. Said especially of a person's health: fairly good; moderately.

Example: middling good

Idiom: fair to middling

colloq
Not bad; fairly good.
Thesaurus: fair, moderately good, so-so, ordinary, average.

Etymology: 15c: Scots.