Plural of backling; movements or actions directed backward, or people moving backward.
From back (Old English bæc, meaning rear) + -ling (suffix forming nouns, from Old English), literally 'things that go back.'
The -ling suffix is wonderfully versatile in English—it can mean a person (duckling, gosling) or an action (backling, sidling), showing how suffixes can transform a direction into both objects and movements.
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