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Glite Dictionary
🔦 Checking with light 🕯️ Making candles
candling

candling

1 7.9
Using a bright light to check inside eggs and thin objects like paper
  • noun
  • /ˈkændlɪŋ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : candilado
  • During the workshop, participants learned about the candling process for assessing egg quality.

Examples

  • The farmer demonstrated egg candling to check which eggs were fertilized.

  • The eggs he sold to the local candling plant, and the berries and vegetables to the local grocers.

    Fiction book (1990)

  • How he had been assigned there for egg candling.

    Academic text (2007)

  • The instructor explained that candling is essential for ensuring healthy development of chicken eggs.

How Thorough

candling
  • Specialized
1 7.9
to inspect
202 2.5
scanning
  • Specialized
4 3.5
to peek
119 1.1

Surface Forms

candling singular
candlings plural

Morphology

candling = candle (semi-transparent) = candle + ing

The word is regularly formed from the verb 'candle' plus '-ing', but the egg-inspection sense is a specialized usage that is only partly predictable.

Etymology

Candling comes from the old practice of using a candle to shine light through things like eggs to see inside, and the root cand- means 'to shine'. So, to candle an egg is to hold it to a light to check its quality or development.