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
- unroweled adjective
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.
Johnny took off his spurs and showed the silversmith a broken rowel.
From "Johnny Tremain" by Esther Hoskins Forbes
It is not started by slight scratches, but strike the rowel deep, and there is a purpose in it that nothing can conquer or restrain.
From A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention For Proposing Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, Held at Washington, D.C., in February, A.D. 1861 by Chittenden, L. E. (Lucius Eugene)
Some ladies affect two spurs—one, the right, being fitted with a blank rowel; this is, of course, for appearance sake when dismounted.
From Ladies on Horseback Learning, Park-Riding, and Hunting, with Hints upon Costume, and Numerous Anecdotes by Lambert, Nannie
The reason of this charge being called the spur fire is, because the sparks it yields have a great resemblance to the rowel of a spur, from whence it takes its name.
From Endless Amusement A Collection of Nearly 400 Entertaining Experiments by Unknown
A rowel is to be made in the dewlap by taking a skein of hemp, tow, or twisted packthread, a foot long, and as thick as a man's thumb.
From On the cattle plague: or, Contagious typhus in horned cattle. Its history, origin, description, and treatment by Bourguignon, Honor?
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.
