To flinch, recoil, or shrink back in pain, fear, or surprise; to hesitate or shy away from something.
From Old English 'blencan' meaning to deceive or turn aside, related to 'blink.' Over time, the sense shifted from 'turning away deceptively' to 'physically recoiling from something unpleasant.'
In Scottish and Northern English dialects, 'blench' remains vivid and common—it describes that involuntary moment when you flinch at pain, capturing a split-second physical reaction that other words gloss over too broadly.
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