tail | |
1. subst. (anatomy) The caudal appendage of an animal that is attached to its posterior and near the anus. | |
Most primates have a tail and fangs. | |
2. subst. The tail-end of an object, e.g. the rear of an aircraft's fuselage, containing the tailfin. | |
3. subst. An object or part of an object resembling a tail in shape, such as the thongs on a cat-o'-nine-tails. | |
4. subst. The rear structure of an aircraft, the empennage. | |
5. subst. Specifically, the visible stream of dust and gases blown from a comet by the solar wind. | |
6. subst. The latter part of a time period or event, or (collectively) persons or objects represented in this part. | |
7. subst. (statistics) The part of a distribution most distant from the mode; as, a long tail. | |
8. subst. One who surreptitiously follows another. | |
9. subst. (cricket) The last four or five batsmen in the batting order, usually specialist bowlers. | |
10. subst. (typography) The lower loop of the letters in the Roman alphabet, as in g, q or y. | |
11. subst. (chiefly in the plural) The side of a coin not bearing the head; normally the side on which the monetary value of the coin is indicated; the reverse. | |
12. subst. (mathematics) All the last terms of a sequence, from some term on. | |
A sequence(a_n) is said to be frequently0 if every tail of the sequence contains0. | |
13. subst. (now colloquial, chiefly US) The buttocks or backside. | |
14. subst. (slang) The penis of a person or animal. | |
15. subst. (slang) Sexual intercourse. | |
I'm gonna get me some tail tonight. | |
16. subst. (kayaking) The stern; the back of the kayak. | |
17. subst. The back, last, lower, or inferior part of anything. | |
18. subst. A train or company of attendants; a retinue. | |
19. subst. (anatomy) The distal tendon of a muscle. | |
20. subst. A downy or feathery appendage of certain achens, formed of the permanent elongated style. | |
21. subst. (surgery) A portion of an incision, at its beginning or end, which does not go through the whole thickness of the skin, and is more painful than a complete incision; called also tailing. | |
22. subst. One of the strips at the end of a bandage formed by splitting the bandage one or more times. | |
23. subst. (nautical) A rope spliced to the strap of a block, by which it may be lashed to anything. | |
24. subst. (music) The part of a note which runs perpendicularly upward or downward from the head; the stem. | |
25. subst. (mining) A tailing. | |
26. subst. (architecture) The bottom or lower portion of a member or part such as a slate or tile. | |
27. subst. (colloquial, dated) A tailcoat. | |
28. v. To follow and observe surreptitiously. | |
Tail that car! | |
29. v. (architecture) To hold by the end; said of a timber when it rests upon a wall or other support; with in or into | |
30. v. (nautical) To swing with the stern in a certain direction; said of a vessel at anchor. | |
This vessel tails downstream. | |
31. v. To follow or hang to, like a tail; to be attached closely to, as that which can not be evaded. | |
32. v. To pull or draw by the tail. | |
33. adj. (legal) Limited; abridged; reduced; curtailed. | |
estate tail | |
34. subst. (legal) Limitation of inheritance to certain heirs. | |
tail male — limitation to male heirs | |
in tail — subject to such a limitation | |