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rat-tail

British  

noun

  1. another name for grenadier

    1. a horse's tail that has no hairs

    2. a horse having such a tail

  2. a style of spoon in which the line of the handle is prolonged in a tapering moulding along the back of the bowl

  3. a kind of woodworking or metalworking file

"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

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.

The first boy I love has a rat-tail.

From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 30, 2024

So Rust and Marty achieve some kind of middle-aged detente–Rust with his rat-tail stache and haunted eyes, Marty with his gut hanging over his golf pants.

From Time • Mar. 3, 2014

He favored "Java rat-tail cigars, a contriving of Pain's fireworks dimensions which burned with a clear blue flame like a fuse and possessed an aroma comparable to that of Cambridgeport city dump."

From Time Magazine Archive

You can bend a rat-tail file or ice pick in a vise to fashion a tool.

From Time Magazine Archive

He was master of Tresco’s bench; the gravers and the rat-tail files, the stock-drills and the corn-tongs were under his hand for good or for evil.

From The Tale of Timber Town by Grace, Alfred A. (Alfred Augustus)