Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A sharp-toothed wheel inserted into the end of the shank of a spur.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To use the rowel on; put spurs to.
- In farriery, to apply a rowel to.
- To furnish with a rowel, as a spur.
- noun . A small wheel, ring, or circle.
- noun The wheel of a horseman's spur, armed with pointed rays.
- noun A roller on the mouthpiece of an old form of bit for horses.
- noun In farriery, a seton inserted in the flesh of an animal.
- noun The spiked wheel of some forms of soil-pulverizers and wheel-harrows.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The little wheel of a spur, with sharp points.
- noun A little flat ring or wheel on horses' bits.
- noun (Far.) A roll of hair, silk, etc., passed through the flesh of horses, answering to a seton in human surgery.
- transitive verb (Far.) To insert a rowel, or roll of hair or silk, into (as the flesh of a horse).
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The small spiked
wheel on the end of aspur . - verb transitive To use a rowel on something, especially to drain fluid.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a small spiked wheel at the end of a spur
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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They are of blue steel inlaid with strips of silver, and the rowel is a sort of cogged wheel, from an inch and a half to three inches in diameter.
Anahuac : or, Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern Edward Burnett Tylor
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We all know about her rowel in the White House Administration with Rahm Emanuel, well she seems to be spreading the wealth around.
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So, he's going to have to rowel up the crowd and prosecute that case against John McCain.
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Carry the youth to the presence, and I will remain here, with bridle in hand, ready to strike the spurs up to the rowel-heads, in case the hawk flies my way. —
The Abbot 2008
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It was caked and corroded with rust, worn almost paper-thin, but he knew it for what it was -- a spur-rowel, unmistakably Spanish with its long cruel points.
People of the Dark Howard, Robert E. 2005
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I had no spurs, neither was my horse one to need the rowel; I rather held him in than urged him, for he was fresh as ever; and I knew that the black steed in front, if he breasted the steep ascent, where the track divided, must be in our reach at once.
Lorna Doone Richard Doddridge 2004
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Wild with his wrong, he struck the rowel deep into the flank of his wading horse, and in scorn of the depth drove him up the river.
Mary Anerley Richard Doddridge 2004
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I measured one which was six inches in the diameter of the rowel, and the rowel itself contained upwards of thirty points.
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I measured one which was six inches in the diameter of the rowel, and the rowel itself contained upwards of thirty points.
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Dig your spurs in my body up to the rowel, draw your sword, and keep yourself ready, for we shall have to leap over both bridge and dragon.
brtom commented on the word rowel
"I'll dig my spurs in him up to the rowel."
Joyce, Ulysses, 15
February 8, 2007
reesetee commented on the word rowel
the small wheel at the end of a spur
February 23, 2007
sionnach commented on the word rowel
It's rumored that Harry Hotspur suffered from irritable rowel syndrome. As opposed to the Johnny Appleseed, who suffered from irritable trowel syndrome. or Vanna White, who ...
I need hardly say more.
April 9, 2008
chained_bear commented on the word rowel
"He creaked and jingled as he walked. The rowel was missing from one of his spurs. He looked hot, and fairly cross."
—Diana Gabaldon, Voyager (NY: Dell, 1994), 807
January 17, 2010
knitandpurl commented on the word rowel
"They were the eyes of a dwindling life, of a horse accustomed to the rowel on her silver bit, to a man's grim hand on her headstall."
"Twins" by C.E. Morgan, in The New Yorker, June 14 & 21, 2010, page 131
July 13, 2010
5814738 commented on the word rowel
"The only item of interest was in the bottom drawer: a pair of spurs. One still had its star rowel, but the other had been broken off." From Wizard and Glass by Stephen King.
January 28, 2011