tong

Meanings

1. An instrument or tool used for manipulating things in a fire without touching them with the hands.

1. To use tongs.
2. To grab, manipulate or transport something using tongs.

1. A Chinese lineage organization responsible for managing ancestral land.
2. A Chinese secret society or gang.

1. Obsolete spelling of tongue.

1. A surname.
2. A place in the United Kingdom:
3. A hamlet in Headcorn parish, Maidstone district, Kent, England (OS grid ref TQ8346).
4. A village and civil parish in eastern Shropshire, England (OS grid ref SJ7907).
5. A small village in the Metropolitan Borough of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England (OS grid ref SE2230).
6. A village north of Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, Western Isles council area, Scotland (OS grid ref NB4436).

Etymology

From Middle English tonge (“tongs, fang”), tange, from Old English tange, from Proto-West Germanic *tangu, from Proto-Germanic *tangō, from Proto-Indo-European *denḱ- (“to bite”). Cognate with Old Norse tǫng (modern Icelandic töng), Old High German zanga (modern German Zange). Other cognates include Sanskrit दशति (dáśati, “to bite”) and Albanian dang (“bite, nip”).