hamstring
[ham-string]
- (in humans and other primates) any of the tendons that bound the ham of the knee.
- (in quadrupeds) the great tendon at the back of the hock.
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- to disable by cutting the hamstring or hamstrings; cripple.
- to render powerless or useless; thwart: Their efforts were hamstrung by stubborn pride.
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Origin of hamstring
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for hamstrung
Contemporary Examples
Consumers, hamstrung by low confidence and a weak recovery, are reluctant to spend and borrow.
Hamstrung by the lower standards of the boom years, it reported that it was still coping with the overhang of the bubble.
But Netanyahu may be hamstrung by a lack of international support, reports Dan Ephron.
Hamstrung and weakened, labor would be in poor position to fight Brown as it did Davis and Schwarzenegger.
Historical Examples
If I am to administer this office, I will not be hamstrung by constant 36 Executive interference.
The ClansmanThomas Dixon
We say when we cut these large muscles that we have “hamstrung” the animal.
The Later Cave-MenKatharine Elizabeth Dopp
It was the horse Tommasino had ridden; it was hamstrung, and its throat had been cut.
The Chronicles of Count AntonioAnthony Hope
Had he been less heavily muscled, this attack might have hamstrung him.
Red FoxCharles G. D. Roberts
I struggled to rise, but I could only flounder like a hamstrung horse.
The Exploits Of Brigadier GerardArthur Conan Doyle
hamstring
- anatomy any of the tendons at the back of the kneeRelated adjective: popliteal
- the large tendon at the back of the hock in the hind leg of a horse, etc
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- to cripple by cutting the hamstring of
- to ruin or thwart
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Word Origin
C16: ham 1 + string
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for hamstrung
hamstring
v.
1640s, "to disable, render useless," a figurative verbal extension from the noun hamstring "tendon at the back of the knee" (1560s), from ham "bend of the knee" (see ham (n.1)) + string. Cutting this would render a person or animal lame. Related: Hamstrung.
[I]n hamstring, -string is not the verb string; we do not string the ham, but do something to the tendon called the hamstring; the verb, that is, is made not from the two words ham & string, but from the noun hamstring. It must therefore make hamstringed. [Fowler]
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
hamstring
(hăm′strĭng′)- Any of the tendons at the rear hollow of the human knee.
- hamstrings The hamstring muscle.
- The large tendon in the back of the hind tarsal joint of the quadruped.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
hamstring
[hăm′strĭng′]
- A powerful group of muscles at the back of the thigh that arise in the hip and pelvis and insert as strong tendons behind the knee. The hamstring bends the knee and helps to straighten the hip.
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The American Heritage® Science Dictionary
Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.