rowel
Americannoun
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a small wheel with radiating points, forming the extremity of a spur.
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Veterinary Medicine. a piece of leather or the like inserted beneath the skin of a horse or other animal to promote drainage of an infection.
verb (used with object)
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to prick or urge with a rowel.
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Veterinary Medicine. to insert a rowel in.
noun
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a small spiked wheel attached to a spur
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obsolete vet science a piece of leather or other material inserted under the skin of a horse to act as a seton and allow drainage
verb
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to goad (a horse) using a rowel
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obsolete vet science to insert a rowel in (the skin of a horse) to allow drainage
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of rowel
1350–1400; Middle English rowelle < Middle French ruelle, Old French roel < Late Latin rotella, equivalent to Latin rot ( a ) wheel + -ella -elle
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:
Johnny took off his spurs and showed the silversmith a broken rowel.
From "Johnny Tremain" by Esther Hoskins Forbes
It is less a Great Adventure, perhaps, but, on the other hand, the double-pointed tooth of Anxiety does not rowel quite so often at the core of your heart....
From The Prairie Mother by Arthur E. Becher
Oh—nothin'," mumbled Brig, playing with the rowel on his spur as he watched the cattle graze; "only it seemed like, the way she spoke to you the other day, you'd mebbe met before.
From Bat Wing Bowles by Dane Coolidge
A. The rowel should not be farther than two inches from the horse's flanks.
From New Method of Horsemanship Including the Breaking and Training of Horses, with Instructions for Obtaining a Good Seat. by F. Baucher
Upon his spurs all gory Twelve gilded birdies bore he; Each time with the rowel he pricked his horse The birdies sang with all their force.
From Ulf Van Yern and Other Ballads by George Henry Borrow
Hart roweled Mondale from end to end of the country, leaving the Democratic candidate wounded and bleeding.
From Time Magazine Archive
What roweled the independents was their firm conviction that the scheduled lines could do the job only with the help of their Government "subsidies" in carrying air mail.
From Time Magazine Archive
Usually these legs were clothed in tight-fitting overalls, and his small feet incased in boots of high-grade leather wonderfully roweled.
From Bred of the Desert A Horse and a Romance by Marcus Horton
The dugout of Tucu leaped away like a roweled horse.
From The Pathless Trail by Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
But decency did not explain or defend the fact that he roweled his willing pinto all the way, and arrived in a state of mind that was the reverse of felicitation.
From The Fifth Ace by George W. Gage
Then another rider was on the trail: Tom Beck, roweling his horse, fanning his shoulders with the rein ends, crying aloud to him for speed, his gun in his holster, a useless thing.
From The Last Straw by Harold Titus
It was still another spur roweling me back to the ring of combat.
From The Prairie Mother by Arthur E. Becher
An obsession of haste spurred her with the roweling of suspense and with the companionship of her troubled thoughts she walked on and on.
From A Pagan of the Hills by Charles Neville Buck
The old schooner scrunched her way past the Olenia, roweling the yacht's glossy paint and smearing her with tar and slime.
From Blow The Man Down A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 by Holman Day
Far to the west a faint report was heard and Pete knew that Skinny was roweling the lathered sides of his straining horse.
From Hopalong Cassidy by Clarence E. Mulford
"Where are you coming with that cayuse?" demanded young McCrae, and suddenly raked a rowelled heel behind the animal's shoulder.
From Desert Conquest or, Precious Waters by Clarence H. (Clarence Herbert) Rowe
He was as well here as elsewhere until some substantial reason or some inner spur rowelled him into action.
From The Hidden Places by Bertrand W. Sinclair
Now every bridle is grasped, every sword hilt in grip, and the rowelled heels are ready to dash into the horses' flanks at the first note of the trumpet blast.
From The Young Priest's Keepsake by Michael Phelan
Here, in these desolate barren hills, twenty miles from the nearest human being, it stirred and woke and rowelled him to be moving on.
From McTeague by Frank Norris
His anger rowelled him on, and when he reached the opposite shore of the lake he was obliged to wait for the younger man to come floundering and panting up to him.
From King Spruce, A Novel by Holman Day
What no system can bear indefinitely is the continual rowelling of its vitals by those who are trying to get rich.
From Time Magazine Archive
It was really quite extraordinary how much was accomplished under the nagging spur of weather conditions and the cruel rowelling of Thorpe.
From The Blazed Trail by Stewart Edward White
Only the most merciless of rowelling could goad the jaded beast out of a jog except for short spurts.
From Bloom of Cactus by Ralph P. (Ralph Pallen) Coleman
One such rowelling had just been taking place when, on the Sunday morning following the Easter holidays, Dolph Dennison dropped in to see Reed Opdyke.
From The Brentons by Wilson C. Dexter
For, what great, black horse is this which, despite Carnaby's flailing whip and cruel, rowelling spur, is slowly, surely creeping up with the laboring gray?
From The Amateur Gentleman by Jeffery Farnol
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.
