rawhide
Americannoun
-
untanned skin of cattle or other animals.
-
a rope or whip made of rawhide.
verb (used with object)
noun
-
untanned hide
-
a whip or rope made of strips cut from such a hide
Etymology
Origin of rawhide
Explanation
Rawhide is dried animal skin that hasn't been treated and turned into leather. Lampshades and drum heads are sometimes made from rawhide, and so are those leathery chews you give your dog to gnaw on. To turn an animal hide into something strong and pliant (like boot laces, upholstery, or shoes), it has to be tanned, processed with chemicals that strengthen the material. Rawhide, on the other hand, is raw, or "in its natural state." This means it's more delicate and generally less useful than finished leather. The fact that rawhide stretches and softens when wet makes it ideal for drum heads. Dogs love to chew on rawhide, though many vets discourage it.
Vocabulary lists containing rawhide
Wolf Brother
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Vocabulary from Readings 5, Unit 1
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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:
Metal ring bits adopted from the Spanish caused distinctive fractures in an animal’s teeth and palate; rawhide bridles developed by Native people wore telltale grooves in the lower jaw.
From Science Magazine ● Mar. 29, 2023
It’s clear from the jump that Phil was in love with him: the butchest cowboy who ever roamed the range, the man who taught him to braid rawhide.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 16, 2022
Three days later, the campaign chiefs from Florida and Arizona were summoned to the Roosevelt Room, where Trump gnawed on them furiously like a dog with a length of old rawhide.
From Salon ● May 31, 2020
Mr. Kochever, 71, was recently standing over an odd assortment of football paraphernalia, all of it strewn throughout his bedroom: flags, dog masks, necklaces, rawhide bones.
From New York Times ● Feb. 3, 2018
I could crack that rawhide popper louder than a gunshot.
From "Old Yeller" by Fred Gipson
For 15 minutes she rawhided the critic in German.
From Time Magazine Archive
"Ollie" Burke kidded and rawhided them into battle shape, turned his engines at 31 knots, dressed each ship with a new in-signe: the "Little Beaver," a character from Artist Fred Harman's comic strip Red Ryder.
From Time Magazine Archive
Labor The two big-bodied, grim-faced men sat in their green-walled hotel suites in Washington and listened as the President rawhided them over the radio.
From Time Magazine Archive
In the evenings he brought work home and labored far into the night, frequently calling staff members in for consultation or for rawhiding rebuke.
From Time Magazine Archive
Krug remained silent; he suffered Lewis's rawhiding without complaint.
From Time Magazine Archive
But they also knew him as a rawhiding commander who knew no friends.
From Time Magazine Archive
Seldom had a top-rank businessman given business such a rawhiding.
From Time Magazine Archive
But I was glad, sometimes, when he was rawhiding us into shape, that Magnus Thorkelson was drilling with a wooden gun.
From Vandemark's Folly by Herbert Quick
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
