tenaille

British  

/ tɛˈneɪl /

noun

1. fortifications a low outwork in the main ditch between two bastions

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Etymology

Origin of tenaille

C16: from French, literally: tongs, from Late Latin tenācula, pl of _tenaculum

Example Sentences

My uncle Toby filled his second pipe; and had it not been, that he now and then wandered from the point, with considering whether it was not full as well to have the curtain of the tenaille a straight line, as a crooked one,—he might be said to have thought of nothing else but poor Le Fever and his boy the whole time he smoaked it.

From Project Gutenberg

To these subjoined the nicest aids of art— Glacis and bastions, flanks and counter scarps, Horn works and moat, half moons and covert way, Trenches and mines, tenaille and battery, With guns of every size and every bore, And such a host of desperadoes there, Who to the last drop of their blood would hold it, That none but devils, I presume, can take it.

From Project Gutenberg

He appears to have been the first who frankly advocated the tenaille alone, chiefly on the ground that the flank, which was the most important part of the bastioned system, was also the weakest.

From Project Gutenberg

For a dry and level site he recommended a bastioned trace; but for wet ditches and for irregular ground, tenaille traces.

From Project Gutenberg

Montalembert was one of the first to foresee the coming necessity for detached forts, and it was for these that he chiefly proposed to use his caponier flanking, preferring the tenaille system for large places.

From Project Gutenberg