handspike
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of handspike
1605–15; < Dutch handspaak ( see hand, spoke 2), with -spaak replaced by spike 1
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.
Friday went forward after a handspike, and Tom leaned his elbows on the rail and watched the approaching vessel.
From No Moss The Career of a Rolling Stone by Castlemon, Harry
This feller handles it as if it was a handspike.
From Si Klegg, Book 2 (of 6) Thru The Stone River Campaign And In Winter Quarters At Murfreesboro by McElroy, John
Nay; the man, though short in stature, was as thin as a handspike.
From The Quest of the 'Golden Hope' A Seventeenth Century Story of Adventure by Westerman, Percy F. (Percy Francis)
The other man said that he was, and Webster waved his handspike.
From The Boy Ranchers of Puget Sound by Bindloss, Harold
Once or twice the handspike or peevie had been torn from his grasp, and the lives of his comrades had been placed in peril.
From The Greater Power by Dunton, W. Herbert
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.
