gallows tree
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of gallows tree
before 900; Middle English galwe tree, Old English galgtrēow, equivalent to galg ( a ) gallows + trēow tree
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
And the men sing, On Mountjoy one Monday morning High upon the gallows tree, Kevin Barry gave his young life For the cause of liberty.
From "Angela's Ashes: A Memoir" by Frank McCourt
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Well, the mobs have broke in and tore down the fences, and snapped off the branches, and scattered all the leaves about, and it looks no better than a gallows tree.
From The Clockmaker Or, the Sayings and Doings of Samuel Slick, of Slickville by Haliburton, Thomas Chandler
Well, the mobs have broken in and tore down the fences, and snapped off the branches, and scattered all the leaves about, and it looks no better than a gallows tree.'
From The Clockmaker — or, the Sayings and Doings of Samuel Slick, of Slickville by Haliburton, Thomas Chandler
On one occasion," he tells me, "Punch suspended me, pictorially of course, from a gallows tree.
From The History of "Punch" by Spielmann, M. H. (Marion Harry)
It was a little thing to do, Will thought, for one who had saved him from the gallows tree.
From Stories of the Border Marches by Lang, Jeanie
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.