lariat
Americannoun
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a long, noosed rope used to catch horses, cattle, or other livestock; lasso.
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a rope used to picket grazing animals.
noun
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another word for lasso
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a rope for tethering animals
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of lariat
1825–35; < Spanish la reata the riata
Explanation
A lariat is another word for a lasso, the loop of rope you'd use to catch a steer if you were a cowboy. While lariat and lasso can be used interchangeably, it's more common for U.S. cowboys to call the looped rope they throw around the necks of errant cattle a lariat (or simply a "rope") and to use lasso as a verb. If you want to fit in on a ranch, you might say, "Throw me that lariat so I can lasso that steer." Lariat comes from the Spanish la reata, "the rope."
Vocabulary lists containing lariat
Butterfly Yellow
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True Grit
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Under a Painted Sky
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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.
See Examples For:
Something seemed to be interacting with the lariat introns after they were removed from the RNA sequence to change their shape, and the spliceosome was his main suspect.
From Science Daily ● May 10, 2024
The response, which included agents on horses, was broadly criticized after images of what appeared to be an agent using his lariat as a whip went viral.
From New York Times ● Jun. 9, 2023
A Reuters video showed a Border Patrol agent using what the news agency described as a lariat to whip at a Haitian migrant trying to enter the United States from Mexico.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 20, 2021
A U.S. law enforcement officer on horseback wielded what appeared to be a lariat, whipping it close to the face of a man wading in the Rio Grande carrying a plastic bag of food.
From Reuters ● Sep. 20, 2021
He tied the lariat rope around her neck and slipped off the bridle to let her graze.
From "Ceremony:" by Leslie Marmon Silko
The collection has eight pieces total, including necklaces, hoops, studs, rings, bracelets and lariats, set in sterling silver and recycled 18-karat gold.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 13, 2024
Recently, researchers at Brown University who were studying the locations of the joining sites in these lariats made an odd observation -- some introns were actually circular instead of lariat shaped.
From Science Daily ● May 10, 2024
Amir’s jewelry company sells a line of lariats, each one featuring a word or phrase.
From Slate ● Oct. 20, 2017
But the heroes of the gathering are the poet lariats … er, laureates … like fifth-generation California cattleman John Dofflemyer who rides herd in the southern Sierra foothills.
From Reuters ● Jan. 31, 2015
But before I could touch the stirrup with my foot, five or six lariats were on me.
From Pan Michael An Historical Novel of Poland, the Ukraine, and Turkey. by Sienkiewicz, Henryk
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.
