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Limb vs Pinion - What's the difference?

limb | pinion | Related terms |

Limb is a related term of pinion.


As nouns the difference between limb and pinion

is that limb is a major appendage of human or animal, used for locomotion (such as an arm, leg or wing) or limb can be (astronomy) the apparent visual edge of a celestial body while pinion is a wing or pinion can be the smallest gear in a gear drive train.

As verbs the difference between limb and pinion

is that limb is to remove the limbs from an animal or tree while pinion is (lb) to cut off the pinion of a bird’s wing, or otherwise disable or bind its wings, in order to prevent it from flying.

limb

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) lim, from (etyl) . The silent -b began to appear in the late 1500s.

Noun

(en noun)
  • A major appendage of human or animal, used for locomotion (such as an arm, leg or wing).
  • *
  • *:Three chairs of the steamer type, all maimed, comprised the furniture of this roof-garden, withon one of the copings a row of four red clay flower-pots filled with sun-baked dust from which gnarled and rusty stalks thrust themselves up like withered elfin limbs .
  • A branch of a tree.
  • (lb) The part of the bow, from the handle to the tip.
  • (lb) The border or upper spreading part of a monopetalous corolla, or of a petal or sepal; blade.
  • (lb) The border or edge of the disk of a heavenly body, especially of the sun or moon.
  • The graduated margin of an arc or circle in an instrument for measuring angles.
  • An elementary piece of the mechanism of a lock.
  • A thing or person regarded as a part or member of, or attachment to, something else.
  • *Sir (Walter Scott) (1771-1832)
  • *:That little limb of the devil has cheated the gallows.
    • Derived terms
    * go out on a limb

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To remove the limbs from an animal or tree.
    • They limbed the felled trees before cutting them into logs.
  • To supply with limbs.
  • * , Walden :
    • Man was not made so large limbed and robust but that he must seek to narrow his world and wall in a space such as fitted him.
    (Milton)
    Synonyms
    * delimb

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) limbus , "border".

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (astronomy) The apparent visual edge of a celestial body.
    • solar limb
  • (on a measuring instrument) The graduated edge of a circle or arc.

    • See also

    {{ picdic , image=Human body features-nb.svg , detail1= }}

    Statistics

    * English terms with multiple etymologies

    pinion

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) pignon, from (etyl) .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A wing.
  • * , II.v
    • Therefore do nimble-pinion' d doves draw Love, / And therefore hath the wind-swift Cupid wings.
  • * Alexander Pope
    • Swift on his sooty pinions flits the gnome.
  • * 1839 ,
    • Never seraph spread a pinion / Over fabric half so fair.
  • The joint of a bird's wing farthest from the body.
    • (Johnson)
  • Any of the outermost primary feathers on a bird's wing.
  • * , III.xii
    • An argument that he is pluck'd, when hither / He sends so poor a pinion of his wing
  • A moth of the genus Lithophane .
  • (obsolete) A fetter for the arm.
    • (Ainsworth)

    Verb

    (en verb) :; (lb)
  • (lb) To cut off the pinion of a bird’s wing, or otherwise disable or bind its wings, in order to prevent it from flying.
  • * 1577 , (Barnabe Googe) (translator), (Konrad Heresbach) (author), Foure Bookes of Husbandrie , book iv (1586), page 169:
    • They that meane to fatte Pigions…some…do softly tie their Legges:…some vse onely to pinion them.
  • * 1641–2 , Henry Best (author), Donald Woodward (editor), The Farming and Memorandum Books of Henry Best of Elmswell, 1642: With a Glossary and Linguistic Commentary by Peter McClure , (Oxford University Press)/(British Academy) (1984), ISBN 0197260292 (10), ISBN 9780197260296 (13), page 115:
    • When they are aboute fortnights olde (for they must bee driven noe longer) yow must watch where the henne useth to sitte on nights, and come when it beginneth to bee darke and throwe somethinge over the henne as shee broodeth them, then take and clippe every of theire right wings. Then when they are aboute moneths old, yow must come after the same manner and pinnion or cutte a joynte of every of theire right winges.
  • * ibidem , page 129:
    • The Swanners gette up the younge swannes about midsummer [24 June] and footemarke them for the owners, and then doe they allsoe pinnion them, cuttinge a joynte of theire right winges, and then att Michaellmasse [29 Sept.] doe they bringe them hoame, or else bringe hoame some, and leave the rest att some of the mills and wee sende for them.
  • * 1665–7 , (Abraham Cowley), The Works of Mr Abraham Cowley (fifth edition, 1678), “Several Di?cour?es by way of E??ays, in Ver?e and Pro?e”, essay 9: ‘The ?hortne?s of Life and uncertainty of Riches’, closing verses, verse 3 ( page 138):
    • Suppo?e, thou Fortune could to tamene?s bring, // And clip or pinion her wing; // Suppo?e thou could’?t on Fate ?o far prevail // As not to cut off thy Entail.
  • * 1727 , Peter Longueville, Philip Quarll (1816), page 67:
    • The two old ducks…being pinioned , could not fly away.
  • * 1849 , Daniel Jay Browne, The American Poultry Yard (1855), page 242:
    • They…should have been pinioned at the first joint of the wing.
  • (lb) To bind the arms of any one, so as to deprive him of their use; to disable by so binding; to shackle.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1905, author=
    • , title= , chapter=1 citation , passage=“[…] Captain Markam had been found lying half-insensible, gagged and bound, on the floor of the sitting-room, his hands and feet tightly pinioned , and a woollen comforter wound closely round his mouth and neck?; whilst Mrs. Markham's jewel-case, containing valuable jewellery and the secret plans of Port Arthur, had disappeared. […]”}}
  • * 1916 , , Macmillan Press Ltd, paperback, page 80
    • Nash pinioned his arms behind while Boland seized a long cabbage stump which was lying in the gutter.
  • #
  • #* , V.ii
  • Know, sir that I / Will not wait pinion' d at your master's court, / Nor once be chastis'd with the sober eye / Of dull Octavia.
  • #* 1918 , (Edgar Rice Burroughs), Chapter IX
  • I was suddenly seized from behind and thrown to earth. As I fell, a warm body fell on top of me, and hands grasped my arms and legs. When I could look up, I saw a number of giant fingers pinioning me down, while others stood about surveying me.
  • # To bind fast to something, or together.
    • Derived terms
    * * *
    References
    * “ Pinion, v.'']” listed on page 883/2–3 of volume VII (O–P, ed. , 1908) of ''[[w:Oxford English Dictionary, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles] (1st ed.)

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) pignon.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • The smallest gear in a gear drive train.
  • * 1844 ,
    • A certain period elapses, and some unseen mysterious principle again sets in motion the magic pinions and the wizard wheels.
    Derived terms
    * rack and pinion English terms with transferred senses