feather
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈfɛð.ə(ɹ)/
ipa: /ˈfɛð.ɚ/
rhymes: -ɛðə(ɹ)
Forms: form: feathers
form: fether
Etymology: From Middle English feþer, from Old English feþer, from Proto-West Germanic *feþru, from Proto-Germanic *feþrō, from Proto-Indo-European *péth₂r̥ (“feather, wing”), from *peth₂- (“to fly”).
Cognate with West Frisian fear (“feather”), Cimbrian bèdara, fòdara (“pillowcase”), vèdara (“feather”), Dutch veder, veer (“feather”), German Feder (“feather”), German Low German Fedder (“feather”), Luxembourgish Fieder (“feather”), Vilamovian faoder (“feather”), Yiddish פֿעדער (feder, “feather”), Danish fjeder, fjer (“feather”), Faroese fjøður (“feather”), Icelandic fjöður (“feather”), Norwegian Bokmål fjær, fjør (“feather”), Norwegian Nynorsk fjøder, fjør (“feather”), Swedish fjäder (“feather”). Also Ancient Greek πέτομαι (pétomai, “to fly”), Albanian shpend (“bird”), Latin penna (“feather”), Old Armenian թիռ (tʻiṙ, “flight”).
The sense correlated with splines and keys (sense 4) probably reflects analogy with the fletching sense (sense 3).
Senses: examples: text: Notice, too, that the shaft is not straight, but bent so that the upper surface of the feather is convex, and the lower concave.
ref: 1873, W. K. Brooks, “A Feather”, in Popular Science Monthly, volume IV, page 687:
text: Big fellows they were, all of them, their barbaric headdresses and grotesquely painted faces, together with their many metal ornaments and gorgeously coloured feathers, adding to their wild, fierce appearance.
ref: 1914, Edgar Rice Burroughs, chapter V, in The Beasts of Tarzan:
text: Nesting birds pluck some of their own feathers to line the nest, but feather plucking in pet birds is entirely different.
ref: 2000, C. J. Puotinen, The Encyclopedia of Natural Pet Care, page 362:
glosses: A branching, hair-like structure that grows on the bodies of birds, used for flight, swimming, protection and display.
synonyms: feathers
feathering
horsefeathers
antonyms: spats
glosses: Long hair on the lower legs of a dog or horse, especially a draft horse, notably the Clydesdale breed. Narrowly only the rear hair.
glosses: One of the fins or wings on the shaft of an arrow.
examples: Near-synonym: spline
coordinate_terms: key
spline
glosses: A longitudinal strip projecting from an object to strengthen it, or to enter a channel in another object and thereby prevent displacement sideways or rotationally but permit motion lengthwise.
examples: text: I am not of that feather to shake off / My friend when he must need me.
ref: c. 1605–1608 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
glosses: Kind; nature; species (from the proverbial phrase "birds of a feather").
glosses: One of the two shims of the three-piece stone-splitting tool known as plug and feather or plug and feathers; the feathers are placed in a borehole and then a wedge is driven between them, causing the stone to split.
glosses: The angular adjustment of an oar or paddle-wheel float, with reference to a horizontal axis, as it leaves or enters the water.
examples: text: To some pew purchasers he gave deeds, to others he gave, none, but both were promised security, and both it seems were equally secure, for the pew deed as Mr. Melledge declared to Mr. G. was not worth a feather.
ref: 1823, An Ecclesiastical Memoir of Essex Street Religious Society:
glosses: Anything petty or trifling; a whit or jot.
topics: hobbies
hunting
lifestyle
glosses: Partridges and pheasants, as opposed to rabbits and hares (called fur).
examples: text: Signal M123 is a conventional 3-aspect colour light with three Junction Indicators - commonly known as 'feathers'.
ref: 2020 December 30, David Allen, “Unusual signals...: Morpeth Signal M123”, in Rail, page 64:
topics: rail-transport
railways
transport
glosses: A junction indicator attached to a colour-light signal at an angle, which lights up, typically with four white lights in a row, when a diverging route is set up.
topics: ball-games
cricket
games
hobbies
lifestyle
sports
glosses: A faint edge.
Synonyms: word: plume
word: pluma
Derived terms: afterfeather
beak and feather disease
beam feather
befeather
birds of a feather
blood feather
cock feather
cock-feather
contour feather
cut a feather
defeather
dot or feather
down feather
featherable
feather alum
featherback
feather-bed
featherbed
feather bed
featherbedding
feather boa
featherbone
feather-brain
featherbrain
feather-brained
featherbrained
feather Christmas tree
feathercoat
featherdom
featherdown
feather-dust
feather duster
feather duster worm
feather edge
feather edger
featherer
featherfoil
featherfoot
feathergrass
feather-grass
feather grass
featherhead
feather-headed
feather-heeled
featherily
featheriness
feathering float
feathering screw
feathering strip
feathering wheel
feather in one's cap
feather in one's hat
featherleaf
feather-legged bug
featherless
featherlet
featherlight
feather-light
featherlike
featherly
feathermaker
feather merchant
feathermonger
feathermoss
feathern
feather ore
feather oyster
featherpate
featherpated
feather pen
feather shot
feathersome
feather spray
feather star
feather stick
featherstitch
feathertail
feather-tailed glider
feather-tailed possum
feather tree
feather-veined
featherweed
featherweight
featherwise
featherwood
feather wool
featherwork
feathery
fine feathers make fine birds
flight feather
gayfeather
horsefeathers
ice feather
Indian feather moss
in fine feather
in full feather
in high feather
knock one over with a feather
knock someone down with a feather
knock someone over with a feather
light as a feather
Mexican feather grass
midfeather
of a feather
parrotfeather
parrot's-feather
pennaceous feather
pin feather
pinfeather
plug and feather
powder-down feather
prince's feather
princess-feather
protofeather
quill feather
rosy feather star
ruffle a few feathers
ruffle some feathers
saddle feather
sea feather
secondary feather
show the white feather
spit feathers
swine's feather
tailfeather
tar-and-feather
unfeather