| lacing | (noun) the act of inflicting corporal punishment with repeated blows | Synonyms: beating, drubbing, licking, thrashing, trouncing, whacking |
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| (noun) a cord that is drawn through eyelets or around hooks in order to draw together two edges (as of a shoe or garment) | Synonyms: lace |
| (noun) a small amount of liquor added to a food or beverage | - |
| lading | (noun) goods carried by a large vehicle | Synonyms: cargo, consignment, freight, load, loading, payload, shipment |
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| lagging | (noun) insulation used to wrap around pipes or boilers or laid in attics to prevent loss of heat | - |
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| landholding | (noun) a holding in the form of land | - |
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| (noun) ownership of land; the state or fact of owning land | - |
| landing | (noun) the act of coming to land after a voyage | - |
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| (noun) the act of coming down to the earth (or other surface) | - |
| (noun) structure providing a place where boats can land people or goods | Synonyms: landing place |
| (noun) an intermediate platform in a staircase | - |
| landscaping | (noun) working as a landscape gardener | Synonyms: landscape gardening |
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| (noun) a garden laid out for esthetic effect | - |
| lapping | (noun) covering with a design in which one element covers a part of another (as with tiles or shingles) | Synonyms: imbrication, overlapping |
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| lapsing | (noun) a failure to maintain a higher state | Synonyms: backsliding, lapse, relapse, relapsing, reversion, reverting |
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| lapwing | (noun) large crested Old World plover having wattles and spurs | Synonyms: green plover, peewit, pewit |
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| lashing | (noun) beating with a whip or strap or rope as a form of punishment | Synonyms: flagellation, flogging, tanning, whipping |
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| (noun) rope that is used for fastening something to something else | - |
| latchstring | (noun) opener consisting of a string that can be passed through a hole in a door for raising the latch from outside | - |
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| launching | (noun) the act of propelling with force | Synonyms: launch |
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| (noun) the act of beginning something new | Synonyms: debut, entry, first appearance, introduction, unveiling |
| (noun) the act of moving a newly built vessel into the water for the first time | - |
| laundering | (noun) washing clothes and bed linens | - |
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| lawmaking | (noun) the act of making or enacting laws | Synonyms: legislating, legislation |
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| laying | (noun) the production of eggs (especially in birds) | Synonyms: egg laying |
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| leaching | (noun) the process of leaching | Synonyms: leach |
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| leading | (noun) thin strip of metal used to separate lines of type in printing | Synonyms: lead |
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| (noun) the activity of leading | Synonyms: leadership |
| leafing | (noun) (botany) the process of forming leaves | Synonyms: foliation |
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| leaning | (noun) the act of deviating from a vertical position | - |
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| (noun) the property possessed by a line or surface that departs from the vertical | Synonyms: inclination, lean, list, tilt |
| (noun) a natural inclination | Synonyms: proclivity, propensity |
| (noun) an inclination to do something | Synonyms: propensity, tendency |
| leaping | (noun) a light, self-propelled movement upwards or forwards | Synonyms: bounce, bound, leap, saltation, spring |
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| learning | (noun) the cognitive process of acquiring skill or knowledge | Synonyms: acquisition |
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| (noun) profound scholarly knowledge | Synonyms: encyclopaedism, encyclopedism, eruditeness, erudition, learnedness, scholarship |
| leavening | (noun) an influence that works subtly to lighten or modify something | Synonyms: leaven |
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| (noun) a substance used to produce fermentation in dough or a liquid | Synonyms: leaven |
| leaving | (noun) the act of departing | Synonyms: departure, going, going away |
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| lecturing | (noun) teaching by giving a discourse on some subject (typically to a class) | Synonyms: lecture |
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| legging | (noun) a garment covering the leg (usually extending from the knee to the ankle) | Synonyms: leg covering, leging |
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| leging | (noun) a garment covering the leg (usually extending from the knee to the ankle) | Synonyms: leg covering, legging |
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| legislating | (noun) the act of making or enacting laws | Synonyms: lawmaking, legislation |
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| lemming | (noun) any of various short-tailed furry-footed rodents of circumpolar distribution | - |
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| lending | (noun) disposing of money or property with the expectation that the same thing (or an equivalent) will be returned | Synonyms: loaning |
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| lengthening | (noun) the act of prolonging something | Synonyms: perpetuation, prolongation, protraction |
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| lessening | (noun) a change downward | Synonyms: decrease, drop-off |
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| lettering | (noun) letters inscribed (especially words engraved or carved) on something | Synonyms: inscription |
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| letting | (noun) property that is leased or rented out or let | Synonyms: lease, rental |
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| leveling | (noun) the act of making equal or uniform | Synonyms: equalisation, equalization |
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| (noun) complete destruction of a building | Synonyms: demolishing, razing, tearing down |
| (noun) changing the ground level to a smooth horizontal or gently sloping surface | Synonyms: grading |
| leveraging | (noun) investing with borrowed money as a way to amplify potential gains (at the risk of greater losses) | Synonyms: leverage |
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| licking | (noun) the act of inflicting corporal punishment with repeated blows | Synonyms: beating, drubbing, lacing, thrashing, trouncing, whacking |
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| (noun) an unsuccessful ending to a struggle or contest | Synonyms: defeat |
| lifesaving | (noun) saving the lives of drowning persons | - |
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| lightening | (noun) changing to a lighter color | Synonyms: whitening |
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| (noun) descent of the uterus into the pelvic cavity that occurs late in pregnancy; the fetus is said to have dropped | - |
| lighting | (noun) the act of setting something on fire | Synonyms: firing, ignition, inflammation, kindling |
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| (noun) the craft of providing artificial light | - |
| (noun) apparatus for supplying artificial light effects for the stage or a film | - |
| (noun) having abundant light or illumination | Synonyms: light |
| lightning | (noun) the flash of light that accompanies an electric discharge in the atmosphere (or something resembling such a flash); can scintillate for a second or more | - |
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| (noun) abrupt electric discharge from cloud to cloud or from cloud to earth accompanied by the emission of light | - |
| likening | (noun) the act of comparing similarities | - |
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| liking | (noun) a feeling of pleasure and enjoyment | - |
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| limiting | (noun) the grammatical relation that exists when a word qualifies the meaning of the phrase | Synonyms: modification, qualifying |
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| limning | (noun) a drawing of the outlines of forms or objects | Synonyms: delineation, depiction, line drawing |
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| limping | (noun) disability of walking due to crippling of the legs or feet | Synonyms: claudication, gameness, gimp, gimpiness, lameness |
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| ling | (noun) elongated marine food fish of Greenland and northern Europe; often salted and dried | Synonyms: Molva molva |
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| (noun) American hakes | - |
| (noun) elongate freshwater cod of northern Europe and Asia and North America having barbels around its mouth | Synonyms: burbot, cusk, eelpout, Lota lota |
| (noun) common Old World heath represented by many varieties; low evergreen grown widely in the Northern Hemisphere | Synonyms: broom, Calluna vulgaris, heather, Scots heather |
| (noun) water chestnut whose spiny fruit has two rather than 4 prongs | Synonyms: ling ko, Trapa bicornis |
| lingering | (noun) the act of tarrying | Synonyms: tarriance |
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| lining | (noun) the act of attaching an inside lining (to a garment or curtain etc.) | - |
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| (noun) providing something with a surface of a different material | Synonyms: facing |
| (noun) a protective covering that protects an inside surface | Synonyms: liner |
| (noun) a piece of cloth that is used as the inside surface of a garment | Synonyms: liner |
| lipreading | (noun) perceiving what a person is saying by observing the movements of the lips | - |
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| listening | (noun) the act of hearing attentively | Synonyms: hearing |
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| listing | (noun) the act of making a list of items | Synonyms: itemisation, itemization |
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| (noun) a database containing an ordered array of items (names or topics) | Synonyms: list |
| living | (noun) the experience of being alive; the course of human events and activities | Synonyms: life |
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| (noun) people who are still living | - |
| (noun) the financial means whereby one lives | Synonyms: bread and butter, keep, livelihood, support, sustenance |
| (noun) the condition of living or the state of being alive | Synonyms: aliveness, animation, life |
| loading | (noun) the labor of putting a load of something on or in a vehicle or ship or container etc. | - |
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| (noun) goods carried by a large vehicle | Synonyms: cargo, consignment, freight, lading, load, payload, shipment |
| (noun) weight to be borne or conveyed | Synonyms: burden, load |
| (noun) a quantity that can be processed or transported at one time | Synonyms: load |
| (noun) the ratio of the gross weight of an airplane to some factor determining its lift | - |
| loafing | (noun) having no employment | Synonyms: idleness, idling |
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| loaning | (noun) disposing of money or property with the expectation that the same thing (or an equivalent) will be returned | Synonyms: lending |
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| loathing | (noun) hate coupled with disgust | Synonyms: abhorrence, abomination, detestation, execration, odium |
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| locating | (noun) the act of putting something in a certain place | Synonyms: emplacement, location, placement, position, positioning |
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| (noun) a determination of the place where something is | Synonyms: fix, localisation, localization, location |
| locking | (noun) the act of locking something up to protect it | Synonyms: lockup |
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| lockring | (noun) washer that prevents a nut from loosening | Synonyms: lock ring, lock washer |
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| lodging | (noun) the act of lodging | - |
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| (noun) structures collectively in which people are housed | Synonyms: housing, living accommodations |
| (noun) the state or quality of being lodged or fixed even temporarily | Synonyms: lodgement, lodgment |
| logging | (noun) the work of cutting down trees for timber | - |
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| logrolling | (noun) rotating a log rapidly in the water (as a competitive sport) | Synonyms: birling |
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| (noun) act of exchanging favors for mutual gain; especially trading of influence or votes among legislators to gain passage of certain projects | - |
| longing | (noun) prolonged unfulfilled desire or need | Synonyms: hungriness, yearning |
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| looking | (noun) the act of searching visually | Synonyms: looking for |
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| (noun) the act of directing the eyes toward something and perceiving it visually; look | Synonyms: look, looking at |
| looping | (noun) (computer science) executing the same set of instructions a given number of times or until a specified result is obtained | Synonyms: iteration |
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| loosening | (noun) the act of making something less tight | Synonyms: laxation |
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| (noun) an occurrence of control or strength weakening | Synonyms: relaxation, slackening |
| looting | (noun) plundering during riots or in wartime | Synonyms: robbery |
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| lovemaking | (noun) sexual activities (often including sexual intercourse) between two people | Synonyms: love, love life, making love, sexual love |
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| lowering | (noun) the act of causing to become less | - |
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| (noun) the act of causing something to move to a lower level | Synonyms: letting down |
| luging | (noun) riding a light one-man toboggan | - |
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| lumbering | (noun) the trade of cutting or preparing or selling timber | - |
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| lunching | (noun) the act of eating lunch | - |
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| luting | (noun) a substance for packing a joint or coating a porous surface to make it impervious to gas or liquid | Synonyms: lute |
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| lying | (noun) the deliberate act of deviating from the truth | Synonyms: fabrication, prevarication |
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| lynching | (noun) putting a person to death by mob action without due process of law | - |
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| mailing | (noun) the transmission of a letter | Synonyms: posting |
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| (noun) mail sent by a sender at one time | - |
| mainspring | (noun) the most important spring in a mechanical device (especially a clock or watch); as it uncoils it drives the mechanism | - |
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| making | (noun) the act that results in something coming to be | Synonyms: devising, fashioning |
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| (noun) (usually plural) the components needed for making or doing something | - |
| (noun) an attribute that must be met or complied with and that fits a person for something | Synonyms: qualification |
| malingering | (noun) evading duty or work by pretending to be incapacitated | Synonyms: skulking |
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| manufacturing | (noun) the act of making something (a product) from raw materials | Synonyms: fabrication, manufacture |
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| mapmaking | (noun) the making of maps and charts | Synonyms: cartography |
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| mapping | (noun) (genetics) the process of locating genes on a chromosome | Synonyms: chromosome mapping |
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| (noun) the process of making maps | - |
| (noun) (mathematics) a mathematical relation such that each element of a given set (the domain of the function) is associated with an element of another set (the range of the function) | Synonyms: function, map, mathematical function, single-valued function |
| marauding | (noun) Raiding and pillaging. | - |
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| marbleising | (noun) a texture like that of marble | Synonyms: marbleisation, marbleization, marbleizing |
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| marbleizing | (noun) a texture like that of marble | Synonyms: marbleisation, marbleising, marbleization |
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| marbling | (noun) the intermixture of fat and lean in a cut of meat | - |
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| marching | (noun) the act of marching; walking with regular steps (especially in a procession of some kind) | Synonyms: march |
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| marketing | (noun) the exchange of goods for an agreed sum of money | Synonyms: merchandising, selling |
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| (noun) shopping at a market | - |
| (noun) the commercial processes involved in promoting and selling and distributing a product or service | - |
| marking | (noun) evaluation of performance by assigning a grade or score | Synonyms: grading, scoring |
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| (noun) the act of making a visible mark on a surface | - |
| (noun) a pattern of marks | - |
| (noun) a distinguishing symbol | Synonyms: mark, marker |
| masking | (noun) the act of concealing the existence of something by obstructing the view of it | Synonyms: cover, covering, screening |
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| (noun) scenery used to block the audience's view of parts of the stage that should not be seen | Synonyms: masking piece |
| (noun) the blocking of one sensation resulting from the presence of another sensation | - |
| mastering | (noun) the act of making a master recording from which copies can be made | - |
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| (noun) becoming proficient in the use of something; having mastery of | - |
| matchmaking | (noun) mediation in order to bring about a marriage between others | - |
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| mating | (noun) the act of pairing a male and female for reproductive purposes | Synonyms: conjugation, coupling, pairing, sexual union, union |
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| matting | (noun) a covering of coarse fabric (usually of straw or hemp) | - |
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| (noun) mounting consisting of a border or background for a picture | Synonyms: mat |
| meaning | (noun) the idea that is intended | Synonyms: substance |
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| (noun) the message that is intended or expressed or signified | Synonyms: import, significance, signification |
| measuring | (noun) the act or process of assigning numbers to phenomena according to a rule | Synonyms: measure, measurement, mensuration |
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| meatpacking | (noun) wholesale packaging of meat for future sale (including slaughtering and processing and distribution to retailers) | Synonyms: meat-packing business, meat packing |
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| meddling | (noun) the act of altering something secretly or improperly | Synonyms: tampering |
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| meeting | (noun) the social act of assembling for some common purpose | Synonyms: coming together, congress |
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| (noun) the act of joining together as one | Synonyms: coming together, merging |
| (noun) a casual or unexpected convergence | Synonyms: encounter |
| (noun) a formally arranged gathering | Synonyms: group meeting |
| (noun) a small informal social gathering | Synonyms: get together |
| (noun) a place where things merge or flow together (especially rivers) | Synonyms: confluence |
| mellowing | (noun) the process of becoming mellow | - |
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