quinch

English

Etymology

First attested 1530 as quynche, possibly from unrecorded Middle English *quinchen, itself of obscure origin. Perhaps a fusion of Middle English quicchen, quecchen (“to shake, tremble; twitch, flinch”) and Middle English winchen (“to flinch, wince; veer or move away”), making it equivalent to a blend of quitch +‎ winch.

Compare Saterland Frisian kwinkje (“to blink, wink with the eyes”), Middle Dutch quincken, quinken ("to shake, quiver"; whence modern Dutch kwinken, kwinkeleren (“to warble”)), German Low German quinken (“to blink, wink”).

Verb

quinch (third-person singular simple present quinches, present participle quinching, simple past and past participle quinched)

1. (obsolete, intransitive) To twitch, as if in pain; flinch, wince.
   • 1598, Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande‎^[1], page 213:

     And therupon to beſtow all my Soldiers in ſuch ſort as I have done, that no part of all that Realm ſhall be able to dare to quinch […]

References

• “quinch”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• Qichun