What does flailing around mean?

/fleɪl/ (also flail about/around) (especially of arms and legs) to move energetically in an uncontrolled way: A wasp came towards us and Howard started flailing his arms around. She ran from the house in a terrible rage, her arms flailing in the air.

What does flail mean?

Definition of flail 1a : to strike with or as if with a flail The bird’s wings flailed the water. b : to move, swing, or beat as if wielding a flail flailing a club to drive away the insects. 2 : to thresh (grain) with a flail. intransitive verb. : to move, swing, or beat like a flail arms flailing in the water.

What flails around?

To move one’s body, often the limbs, in an erratic or clumsy way The last time I tried ice skating, I spent most of the time flailing around and trying desperately not to fall. See also: a home from home.

Is flail a real word?

To flail means to wave around wildly. If you are stranded on a deserted island and you see a ship in the distance, it’s a good idea to flail your arms in the air to get the captain’s attention. Flail originates with the Latin word flagellum, which is a whip.

What is the synonym of flail?

In this page you can discover 19 synonyms, antonyms, idiomatic expressions, and related words for flail, like: beat, thrash, swing, flog, hit at, lash, strike, whip, thresh, toss and toss-and-turn.

Did flails exist?

Flails of many types existed. Most were two-handed. Most had very short chains – they were hinged weapons rather than chain weapons – and long striking heads. That these were the most common flails is not surprising, since “two-handed, short chain, long striking head” describes the common agricultural flail.

What is a antonym for flailing?

Antonyms & Near Antonyms for flailing. motionlessness.

What is a medieval flail?

The flail (sometimes called Morning Star Flail) is a weapon that consists of a striking head attached to a handle by a rope or chain. The main advantage of a medieval flail is its ability to strike around a defender’s shield or parry. However, the flail was a difficult weapon to master and it lacked precision.

Was a Morningstar a real weapon?

A morning star (German: Morgenstern) is any of several medieval club-like weapons consisting of a shaft with an attached ball adorned with one or more spikes. Each used, to varying degrees, a combination of blunt-force and puncture attack to kill or wound the enemy.

Where are flails real?

Only problem is: they never existed. Despite the weapon’s popularity in pop cultural depictions of the Middle Ages, the flail was almost certainly an invention of the imaginations of later people.

What is the part of speech for flail?

Definition of flail noun. an instrument for threshing grain, consisting of a staff or handle with a freely swinging stick or bar attached to one end of it.