Plural of catling; small surgical knives or blades used in medical practice.
Plural form of catling, from cat + -ling + -s. Common in medical terminology from the medieval period through the modern era.
A surgeon's catlings were precious tools—in historical surgical kits, you'd find rows of these tiny, razor-sharp blades, each one carefully maintained. The plural form shows how essential these cat-inspired instruments were to early medicine.
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