Shear vs Nick - What's the difference?

shear | nick |

As a verb shear

is to cut, originally with a sword or other bladed weapon, now usually with shears, or as if using shears.

As a noun shear

is a cutting tool similar to scissors, but often larger.

As an adjective shear

is .

As a proper noun nick is

a diminutive of the male given name nicholas.

shear

English

(wikipedia shear)

Verb

To cut, originally with a sword or other bladed weapon, now usually with shears, or as if using shears.

* 1819 , Walter Scott, Ivanhoe :

So trenchant was the Templar’s weapon, that it shore asunder, as it had been a willow twig, the tough and plaited handle of the mace, which the ill-fated Saxon reared to parry the blow, and, descending on his head, levelled him with the earth.

* Shakespeare

the golden tresses were shorn away

To remove the fleece from a sheep etc by clipping.

(physics) To deform because of shearing forces.

(Scotland) To reap, as grain.

(Jamieson)

(figurative) To deprive of property; to fleece.

Noun

(en noun)

a cutting tool similar to scissors, but often larger

* Dryden

short of the wool, and naked from the shear

the act of shearing, or something removed by shearing

* Youatt

After the second shearing, he is a two-shear' ram; at the expiration of another year, he is a three-' shear ram; the name always taking its date from the time of shearing.

(physics) a force that produces a shearing strain

(geology) The response of a rock to deformation usually by compressive stress, resulting in particular textures.

Derived terms

* megashear * shearer

Adjective

(head)

Anagrams

* English irregular verbs

nick

English

(wikipedia nick)

Noun

(en noun)

A small cut in a surface.

# A particular point or place considered as marked by a nick; the exact point or critical moment.

in the nick of time

#*, II.20:

Truely he flies when he is even upon the nicke , and naturally hasteneth to escape it, as from a step whereon he cannot stay or containe himselfe, and feareth to sinke into it.

#* Howell

to cut it off in the very nick

# (printing, dated) A notch cut crosswise in the shank of a type, to assist a compositor in placing it properly in the stick, and in distribution.

Meanings connoting something small.

# (cricket) A small deflection of the ball off the edge of the bat, often going to the wicket-keeper for a catch.

# (real tennis) The point where the wall of the court meets the floor.

# (genetics) One of the single-stranded DNA segments produced during nick translation.

(archaic) A nixie, or water-sprite.

* 1879 , Viktor Rydberg, The Magic of the Middle Ages (p.201)

*:imps, giants, trolls, forest-spirits, elves and hobgoblins in and on the earth; nicks , river-sprites in the water, fiends in the air, and salamanders in the fire.

a user's reserved nick on an IRC network

(UK, slang) In the expressions in bad nick'' and ''in good nick : condition.

The car I bought was cheap and in good nick .

* '>citation

(British, slang) A police station or prison.

He was arrested and taken down to Sun Hill nick [police station] to be charged.

He's just been released from Shadwell nick [prison] after doing ten years for attempted murder.

Derived terms

* in the nick of time

Verb

(en verb)

To make a nick or notch in; to cut or scratch in a minor way.

I nicked myself while I was shaving.

# To make a cross cut or cuts on the underside of (the tail of a horse, in order to make the animal carry it higher).

# To mar; to deface; to make ragged, as by cutting nicks or notches in.

#* Prior

And thence proceed to nicking sashes.

#* Shakespeare

The itch of his affection should not then / Have nicked his captainship.

To suit or fit into, as by a correspondence of nicks; to tally with.

* Camden

Words nicking and resembling one another are applicable to different significations.

# To hit at, or in, the nick; to touch rightly; to strike at the precise point or time.

#* L'Estrange

The just season of doing things must be nicked , and all accidents improved.

# To throw or turn up (a number when playing dice); to hit upon.

#* {{quote-book, year=1773

, author=Oliver Goldsmith , title=She Stoops to Conquer , text=My old luck: I never nicked seven that I did not throw ames ace three times following.}}

# (cricket) to hit the ball with the edge of the bat and produce a fine deflection

(obsolete) To nickname; to style.

* Ford

For Warbeck, as you nick him, came to me.

(slang) To steal.

Someone's nicked my bike!

(transitive, British, slang) To arrest.

The police nicked him climbing over the fence of the house he'd broken into.