▪ I. † ˈsembling, ppl. a. Obs.
[f. semble v.2 + -ing2.]
1. That feigns or simulates.
| 1557–8 Jacob & Esau v. iv. (1568) F iv b, Ah hypocrite, ah hedgecreeper, ah sembling wretche. 1583 Leg. Bp. St. Androis 916 in Satir. Poems Reform. xlv, They knew him for a sembling baird. 1612 T. Taylor Comm. Titus i. 16 Counterfeit and sembling professors. 1642 S. W. Parl. Vind. Answ. Rupert 3 In this not sembling but suffering age. |
2. That depicts or represents.
| 1706 Prior Ode to Queen xxviii, Where sembling Art may carve the fair Effect. |
▪ II. sembling, vbl. n.2
(ˈsɛmblɪŋ)
Also symbolling.
[See semble v.1]
The action of the verb.
1. gen.
| a 1300 Havelok 1018 Þere was sembling i-now! a 1400–50 Wars Alex. 769 Þe same day at was sett þe sembling of bathe. c 1420 Anturs of Arth. 661 With owttene more lettynge, Was dighte there thiere semblynge. c 1440 Promp. Parv. 452/2 Semlynge, or metynge to-geder, concursus. |
2. Ent. The coming together of a male and a female moth; spec. a method of trapping male moths by using a captive female to attract them.
| 1748 J. Dutfield New Nat. Hist. Engl. Moths & Butterflies s.v. Emperor Moth. What is called Symbolling, or, the Coming together, is particularly observable of this Species. 1894 Science 23 Mar. 156/2 The sembling of a large native moth. 1924 Contemp. Rev. Sept. 364 Collectors of lepidoptera have long known the trick of ‘sembling’ to obtain a large series of males of certain moths. |