Feather

Quick meaning: Feather is a noun meaning A branching, hair-like structure that grows on the bodies of birds, used for flight, swimming, protection and display.

Meaning

A branching, hair-like structure that grows on the bodies of birds, used for flight, swimming, protection and display.

More Meanings

1. Long hair on the lower legs of a dog or horse, especially a draft horse, notably the Clydesdale breed. Narrowly only the rear hair.
2. One of the fins or wings on the shaft of an arrow.
3. Kind; nature; species (from the proverbial phrase "birds of a feather").
4. The angular adjustment of an oar or paddle-wheel float, with reference to a horizontal axis, as it leaves or enters the water.
5. Anything petty or trifling; a whit or jot.
6. A longitudinal strip projecting from an object to strengthen it, or to enter a channel in another object and thereby prevent displacement sideways or rotationally but permit motion lengthwise.
7. One of the two shims of the three-piece stone-splitting tool known as plug and feather or plug and feathers; the feathers are placed in a borehole and then a wedge is driven between them, causing the stone to split.

Example Sentences

Near-synonym: spline

I am not of that feather to shake off / My friend when he must need me.

An Eagle had the ill Hap to be Struck with an Arrow Feather'd from her own Wing.

Signal M123 is a conventional 3-aspect colour light with three Junction Indicators - commonly known as 'feathers'.

Word Forms

• feathers
• feathering
• feathered

Synonyms for feather

Depending on context, synonyms include plume, pluma, feathers, feathering, horsefeathers, spline.

Antonyms for feather

Common opposites include spats.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include plumage, plume, fledge, square, quill, bird.

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