dung
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
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dungs,
present (3rd person singular)
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dunged,
past participle, past
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dunging
present participle
noun
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excrement, esp of animals; manure
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( as modifier )
dung cart
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-
something filthy
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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dungsimple
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dungssimple
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have dungedperfect
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has dungedperfect
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am dungingprogressive
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are dungingprogressive
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is dungingprogressive
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have been dungingperfect progressive
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has been dungingperfect progressive
Past
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dungedsimple
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had dungedperfect
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was dungingprogressive
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were dungingprogressive
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had been dungingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of dung
before 1000; Middle English, Old English; cognate with Low German, German dung; compare Icelandic dyngja heap, dung, Swedish dynga dung, muck, Old High German tunga manuring
Explanation
Dung means animal droppings or waste. If you work at an elephant sanctuary, you're likely to spend a lot of time shoveling up elephant dung. Dung is a tidy word for an untidy substance — animal poop. When farmers talk about cow dung or chicken dung, they'll probably call it manure instead. Some dung causes problems, like the runoff of pig dung into lakes and rivers, while other dung is used to help fertilize vegetable gardens. Dung is an Old English word, from a Germanic root — in Old High German, a tung was an underground room that was covered with dung for warmth.
Vocabulary lists containing dung
Metaphors from Top AP English Exam Novels
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Home of the Brave
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"Death of a Naturalist" by Seamus Heaney
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
In “The Getaway”—filmed twice for the big screen—Doc and Carol McCoy conclude their escape hiding in caves, then a hut made of dung, before they end up in the infernal domain of El Rey.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 2, 2026
Her neighbour, 45-year-old Munni Bai, who has asthma, had switched to using an electric cooker as well as biogas from cow dung, to help her breathing.
From Barron's ● Mar. 24, 2026
Of particular concern are dung-feeding insects such as flies, dung beetles, and some butterflies.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 22, 2026
“Powdered stone worked. So did lizard’s blood and crocodile dung, and pig’s teeth and dolphin’s genitalia and frog’s sperm,” as psychologist Irving Kirsch later explained it.
From Slate ● Jan. 30, 2026
He grabbed a handful of soapwort leaves, mashed them in water, and washed off the last of the wolverine dung.
From "Wolf Brother" by Michelle Paver
He seldom sat down, but strayed about with nervous movements, picking dungs up and setting them down without looking at them, walking to windows and looking out but seeing nothing.
From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White
When it was gone, hot not before, the Wart knew certain dungs about it—dungs which he had not had time to notice while the boar was there.
From "The Once and Future King" by T. H. White
He is like a horse in a pasture, that eats up the grass and dungs it in requital.
From Character Writings of the 17th Century by Various
Besides, we have heats of dungs; and of bellies and maws of living creatures, and of their bloods and bodies; and of hays and herbs laid up moist; of lime unquenched; and such like.
From New Atlantis by Francis Bacon
Besides, we have heats of dungs, and of bellies and maws of living creatures and of their bloods and bodies, and of hays and herbs laid up moist, of lime unquenched, and such like.
From Ideal Commonwealths by Sir Saint Thomas More
The soil from which he bloomed was richly dunged.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 21, 2018
I digged about it, I dunged it; I gained time, and supplied it with means; but I laboured herein in vain, and spent my strength for nought, and in vain!
From Works of John Bunyan — Volume 03 by John Bunyan
It is fixed by oxidation at 30° to 35° C., and dunged with cow-dung and chalk.
From Scientific American Supplement, No. 286, June 25, 1881 by Various
Asparagus haulm should also be cut and carried off the ground, and the beds dunged.
From The Present Picture of New South Wales (1811) by David Dickinson Mann
Hast thou been digg'd about and dunged too, Will neither patience nor yet dressing do?
From Works of John Bunyan — Volume 03 by John Bunyan
In dunging corn in the holes, put two in a hill on any kind of soil where corn will grow, and you will have a good crop.
From The Stronghold A Story of Historic Northern Neck of Virginia and Its People by Miriam Haynie
And thus much for the fashion, digging, and dunging of gardens.
From The English Husbandman The First Part: Contayning the Knowledge of the true Nature of euery Soyle within this Kingdome: how to Plow it; and the manner of the Plough, and other Instruments by Gervase Markham
But as for our Monkish Antiquaries, and the Monastick Learning, it seems to be reserv'd for the Improvement of those, whose Minds, like barren Soils, will never bear without dunging.
From An Essay on Criticism by John Oldmixon
The exhibit consists of a Universal calender, drying machines, patent creasing, measuring, and marking machines, and apparatus for bleaching, washing, chloring, scouring, soaping, dunging, and dyeing woven fabrics.
From Scientific American Supplement, No. 460, October 25, 1884 by Various
In respect to the beaver dunging in their houses, as some persons assert, it is quite wrong, as they always plunge into the water to do it.
From A Journey from Prince of Wales's Fort in Hudson's Bay to the Northern Ocean in the Years 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772 New Edition with Introduction, Notes, and Illustrations by J. B. Tyrrell
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
