transitive verb

• 1Carve (wood) into an object by repeatedly cutting small slices from it.

  ‘He volleyed as if he was using his racket to whittle wood, slicing this way and that and caressing the ball into submission.’

  More example sentences

  • ‘We were forced to hotfoot it to Borneo, where we lived on the edge of the jungle for the next twenty years, whittling wood into supposedly erotic shapes that we then sold as tribal trinkets.’
  • ‘The Americans of the volunteers joked about how whittling wood was an American habit.’
  • ‘Later when he swore off smoking, he took up whittling wood.’
  • ‘I really like the spey blade, as it offers a long straight edge for doing really important tasks: things like whittling a sharp point on an old stick.’
  • ‘He was whittling a piece of wood the size of his palm.’
  • ‘Excitedly, Vivienne raised her camera to capture the woman on film, then snapped some shots of an old man whittling a piece of wood.’
  • ‘Her father just sat in a corner whittling a piece of wood.’
  • ‘A willowy soldier leaned against a tree near where he stood, whittling a piece of wood.’
  • ‘How many millions were spent whittling that piece of wet balsam, I've no idea; it means nothing and invites ridicule.’
  • ‘Seve cut his sticks to length, whittled a point in the slender end and drove it into the hosel - the round socket at the top of the iron head.’
  • ‘With a jackknife, he whittled a point on a thin green stick pulled from a maple branch.’
  • ‘Then, he painstakingly whittles each one a 10-inch handle with a kitchen knife, and waits till dark.’

  Synonyms

  pare, shave, peel, cut, hew, trim, carve, shape, model

  View synonyms

  1. 1.1Carve (an object) from wood by repeatedly cutting small slices from it.
     ‘He had given the horses some grain, and now he was whittling a figure out of a piece of wood.’
     More example sentences

     • ‘It turns out it's whittling wooden figurines for schoolchildren.’
     • ‘And many people obviously rely on the good old Swiss Army knife or one of its derivatives for everything from trimming nails and opening bottles to putting in screws and whittling firesticks.’
  2. 1.2whittle something away/downReduce something in size, amount, or extent by a gradual series of steps.
     ‘the short list of fifteen was whittled down to five’
     More example sentences

     • ‘the censors had whittled away at the racy dialogue’
     • ‘Vast amounts are whittled away on such concepts as benchmarking and decentralisation, but urgent road projects are still being argued over at Oireachtas committees.’
     • ‘After a bit of experimentation, Jill is able to whittle the problem down to four steps that always cause the same behavior.’
     • ‘Goddard explains: ‘Gradually we just whittled the novel away.’’
     • ‘Gradually the lead was whittled down until there were only three points between the sides with a few minutes remaining.’
     • ‘Tory MPs will whittle the candidates down to two in a series of ballots starting on October 18.’
     • ‘The group, which included town councillors and main figures in the development process, debated a number of options before whittling them down to three main contenders.’
     • ‘A panel of judges whittled them down to the last three and we thought his was by far the best.’
     • ‘Hundreds of hopefuls entered the competition and judges at Boss Model agency have whittled them down to 10 boys and 10 girls.’
     • ‘On Wednesday, their provisional 67-man squad is whittled down to produce a final 37-man selection for this summer's tour to Australia.’
     • ‘You can't help wondering why a company that whittled Hamlet down to 90 minutes needs two-and-a-half hours for a relatively obscure Chekhov story.’
     Synonyms

     erode, wear away, eat away, consume, use up, reduce, diminish, undermine, weaken, threaten, sabotage, subvert, compromise, destroy, impair, mar, spoil, ruin, impede, hinder, damage, hurt, injure, cripple, disable, enfeeble, emasculate, sap, shake, break, crush

     reduce, cut down, cut back, cut, prune, trim, slim down, pare down, salami-slice, shrink, make cutbacks in, lessen, decrease, diminish, make reductions in, scale down

     View synonyms