Definitions

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Beating irregularly; -- of the heart.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Present participle of palpitate.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective having a slight and rapid trembling motion

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Whether it would have been distasteful to the feelings of the founder of that cult is another question, and, debased or not, it is at least alive and palpitating, which is more than can be said of certain other varieties.

    Old Calabria Norman Douglas 1910

  • Was it not more "palpitating" to set the prodigal in modern Paris?

    The Belovéd Vagabond William John Locke 1896

  • Beneath the bonnet (which was large) appeared a little, round, agitated old face, with bobbing white curls and white teeth set a little apart in the mouth, a defect that brought a kind of palpitating frankness into the expression.

    Stories of a western town 1893

  • In two hours and a-half sixty cords of wood were transferred from the bank to the boat, and the Wasp, calling the palpitating wood-carriers around him, thus addressed them: "Now, you boys, listen.

    The Great South; A Record of Journeys in Louisiana, Texas, the Indian Territory, Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland 1875

  • a little, round, agitated old face, with bobbing white curls and white teeth set a little apart in the mouth, a defect that brought a kind of palpitating frankness into the expression.

    Stories of a Western Town Octave Thanet 1892

  • For apart from their skin, eyes, and voice there was nothing human left in these palpitating figures.

    David Harris: Ode to Jan Karski David Harris 2011

  • For apart from their skin, eyes, and voice there was nothing human left in these palpitating figures.

    David Harris: Ode to Jan Karski David Harris 2011

  • On them too was the drowse of blood-intimacy, calves sucking and hens running together in droves, and young geese palpitating in the hand while the food was pushed down their throttle.

    Rereading: The Rainbow by DH Lawrence 2011

  • Yet, palpitating and real, shimmering in the sun-flashed dust of ten thousand hoofs, she saw pass, from East to West, across a continent, the great hegira of the land-hungry

    CHAPTER VI 2010

  • She had the grace of a slender flower, the fragility of color and line of fine china, in all of which he pleasured greatly, without thought of the Life Force palpitating beneath and in spite of Bernard Shaw -- in whom he believed.

    A WICKED WOMAN 2010

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