brace

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun A device that holds or fastens two or more parts together or in place; a clamp.
• noun A device, such as a supporting beam in a building or a connecting wire or rope, that steadies or holds something else erect.
• noun Chiefly British Suspenders.
• noun An orthopedic appliance used to support, align, or hold a bodily part in the correct position.
• noun A dental appliance constructed of bands and wires that is fixed to the teeth to correct irregular alignment.
• noun An extremely stiff, erect posture.
• noun A cause or source of renewed physical or spiritual vigor.
• noun A protective pad strapped to the bow arm of an archer.
• noun Nautical A rope by which a yard is swung and secured on a square-rigged ship.
• noun A cranklike handle with an adjustable aperture at one end for securing and turning a bit.
• noun Music A leather loop that slides to change the tension on the cord of a drum.
• noun A vertical line, usually accompanied by the symbol {, connecting two or more staffs.
• noun A set of staffs connected in this way.
• noun A symbol, { or }, enclosing two or more lines of text or listed items to show that they are considered as a unit.
• noun Mathematics Either of a pair of symbols, { }, used to indicate aggregation or to clarify the grouping of quantities when parentheses and square brackets have already been used.
• noun A pair of like things.
• intransitive verb To furnish with a brace.
• intransitive verb To support or hold steady with or as if with a brace; reinforce.
• intransitive verb To prepare or position so as to be ready for impact or danger.
• intransitive verb To confront with questions or requests.
• intransitive verb To increase the tension of.
• intransitive verb To invigorate; stimulate.
• intransitive verb Nautical To turn (the yards of a ship) by the braces.
• intransitive verb To get ready; make preparations.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun In mining, the flooring around the mouth of a shaft.
• To clasp or grasp; embrace; hold firmly.
• To bind or tie closely; fit or secure by ties; bandage; strap.
• To string or bend (a bow) by putting the eye of the string in the upper nock preparatory to shooting.
• To make tense; strain up; increase the tension, tone, or vigor of; strengthen: used both literally and figuratively: as, to brace the nerves.
• To fix in the position of a brace; hold firmly in place: used reflexively: as, to brace one's self against a post or a crowd.
• To furnish with, or support or prop by, braces: as, to brace a building or a falling wall.
• Nautical, to swing or turn around (the yards of a ship) by means of the braces.
• In writing and printing, to unite or connect by a brace, as two or more lines, staves of music, etc.
• To increase the tension, tone, or vigor of: often used intransitively with the object understood.
• noun In any frame, a stiff piece, as a bar or strip, put in to prevent a parallelogram or the like from changing its shape under pressure or strain.
• noun Same as brace-head.
• noun A short, thick bar lying above the suture between two pyramids in the dental apparatus of Echinus.
• noun In saddlery, the short strap which connects the hip-strap and the breeching-body.
• noun An old measure of weight. A Hurley brace was equal to 4 cwt.
• noun In mining, a platform at the top of a shaft on which miners stand to work the tackle.
• noun A prop or support; specifically, in architecture, a piece of timber placed near and across the angles in the frame of a building in order to strengthen it. When used to support a rafter it is called a strut.
• noun That which holds two or more things firmly together; a cincture or bandage.
• noun A pair; a couple: as, a brace of ducks: used of persons only with a shade of contempt or colloquially.
• noun A thick strap by which a carriage-body is suspended from C-springs.
• noun In printing, a vertical double-curved line, used to connect two or more lines: thus, , or two or more staves in music.
• noun A leather band placed about the cords of a drum and sliding upon them: used to raise or lower the tone by increasing or lessening the tension of the cords: as, “the braces of the war drum,”
• noun plural Straps passing over the shoulders to sustain the trousers; suspenders.
• noun A device for supporting a weak back, curved shoulders, etc.