Jump To:

• hound's tooth
  hound's tooth

  noun

  a pattern of broken or jagged checks, used on a variety of fabrics.
• hound's-tooth
  hound's-tooth

  adjective

  woven or printed with a pattern of broken or jagged checks.

hound's tooth

¹ American  

noun

1. a pattern of broken or jagged checks, used on a variety of fabrics.

---

hound's-tooth ² American  

[houndz-tooth] / ˈhaʊndzˌtuθ /

adjective

1. woven or printed with a pattern of broken or jagged checks.

   a hound's-tooth jacket.

---

Etymology

Origin of hound's tooth¹

First recorded in 1935–40

Origin of hound's-tooth²

First recorded in 1955–60

Example Sentences

To earn it the investigators must appear every day to be clean as a hound’s tooth.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 15, 2017

Said one retail store manager: "Our stocks are as clean as a hound's tooth."

From Time Magazine Archive

Harding asked for time to think, ten minutes later announced that he was as clean as a hound's tooth.

From Time Magazine Archive

A "sense of Congress" resolution with no legal force, the code urges officials to be loyal, hardworking, fair, clean as a hound's tooth.

From Time Magazine Archive

The off hoss is puffed some for'ard but if yer husband'll put on a cold bandage ev'ry night it'll make them legs smoother n a hound's tooth.

From Eben Holden, a tale of the north country by Bacheller, Irving