hurdle
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Topics: athletics
board-games
chess
equestrianism
games
hobbies
horses
lifestyle
pets
sports
Etymology: ]
From Middle English hurdel, hirdel, herdel, hyrdel, from Old English hyrdel (“frame of intertwined twigs used as a temporary barrier”), diminutive of *hyrd, from Proto-Germanic *hurdiz, from Pre-Germanic *kr̥h₂tis, from Proto-Indo-European *kreh₂-. Cognate with Dutch horde, German Hürde.
Inflected forms:
form: hurdles
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: hurdles
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: hurdling
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: hurdled
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: hurdled
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: An artificial barrier, variously constructed, over which athletes or horses jump in a race.
pos: noun
examples: He ran in the 100 metres hurdles.
gloss: An obstacle, real or perceived, physical or abstract.
pos: noun
tags: figuratively
examples: My last stop was an outdoor speech to a huge crowd of Ukrainians whom I urged to stay on the course of freedom and economic reform. Kiev was beautiful in the late spring sunshine, and I hoped its people could keep up the high spirits I had observed in the crowd. They still had many hurdles to clear.
gloss: A movable frame of wattled twigs, osiers, or withes and stakes, or sometimes of iron, used for enclosing land, for folding sheep and cattle, for gates, etc.; also, in fortification, used as revetments, and for other purposes.
pos: noun
examples: The practice of folding sheep was general, and the purchase of hurdles was a regular charge in the shepherd's account.
gloss: A sled or crate on which criminals were drawn to the place of execution.
pos: noun
tags: UK
historical
examples: In treason, the corporal punishment is by drawing on hurdle from the place of the prison to the place of execution, and by hanging and being cut down alive, bowelling, and quartering: and in women by burning.
Such a crew! Ah! many a wretch has rid on hurdles who has done less mischief than these utterers of forged Tales, coiners of Scandal, and clippers of Reputation.
Hurdles, with four, five, six wretches convicted of counterfeiting or mutilating the money of the realm, were dragged month after month up Holborn Hill. On one morning seven men were hanged and a woman burned for clipping
Behind flock'd wrangling up a piteous crew, / Greeted of none, disfeatur'd and forlorn— / Cowards, who were in sloughs interr'd alive: / And round them still the wattled hurdles hung / Wherewith they stamp'd them down, and trod them deep, / To hide their shameful memory from men.
gloss: A piece that is jumped over by a hopper piece.
pos: noun
examples: Pieces that can move only by hopping over other pieces are termed Hoppers. It should be noted that hoppers capture in the usual way by eviction, they do not capture the hurdles over which they hop.
The most popular hoppers are: The Equihopper (G. Leathem FCR 1938) which hops to the same distance beyond the hurdle as it is from it.
gloss: To jump over something while running.
pos: verb
examples: He hurdled the bench in his rush to get away.
gloss: To compete in the track and field events of hurdles (e.g. high hurdles).
pos: verb
gloss: To overcome an obstacle.
pos: verb
gloss: To hedge, cover, make, or enclose with hurdles.
pos: verb
examples: Watching where shepherds pen their flocks at eve
In hurdled cotes amid the field secure
gloss: To jump over another piece without capturing it.
pos: verb
examples: Kangaroo (KA): as G, but hurdles over any two units to land on the first square beyond the second unit (the two units need not be adjacent). […] Saltador (SA): can move without capturing to the same squares as an S, whenever either of the intermediate squares is occupied (by hurdling); can capture on the same squares as an S whenever either of the intermediate squares is empty.
Derived words: fall at the final hurdle
fall at the last hurdle
hurdlemaker
hurdler
hurdlesome
hurdlework
Translations: