spider web

Or spider's web

noun

1. the web that is spun by a spider, made of interlaced threads of viscous fluid that harden on exposure to air.

Word History and Origins

Origin of spider web¹

First recorded in 1525–35

Example Sentences

Now Wall Street prices could be quoted the same day in Philadelphia, and soon in Boston, Buffalo and west to the Mississippi as the telegraph covered the nation like a spider web.

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In the years since the commission’s 2005 decision, abandoned power lines have continued to pose a threat, with hundreds of miles of the unused transmission lines running like spider webs through California.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Other vehicles lay abandoned, their windshields adorned with the telltale spider webs of bullet holes.

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“Everywhere you look, every corner of this school, there’s something going on. There is a giant spider web. Butterflies and bees zip around. There’s bird nests in the bushes.”

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Researchers are even using examples drawn from spider webs to design sensitive microphones that can one day be used to treat hearing loss and deafness and to improve other listening devices.

Read more on New York Times