• Entrail

    Origin 1

    Full definition of entrail

    Verb

    1. (archaic) To interweave or bind.
      • And in the thickest covert of that shade
        There was a pleasant arbour, not by art
        But of the trees' own inclination made,
        With wanton ivy twine entrailed athwart,
        And eglantine and caprifole among,
        Fashioned above within their inmost part
        That neither Phoebus' beams could through them throng
        Nor AEolus' sharp blast could work them any wrong.
      • 1598, William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, letter to his son, reprinted in Annals of the reformation and establishment of religionhttp://books.google.com/books?id=BIENAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA479, 1824, by , page 479,Trust not any with thy life, credit, or estate: for it is mere folly for a man to entrail himself to his friend; as though, occasion being offered, he shall not dare to become his enemy.
      • Himself hid by entrailing foliage,
        Betwixt whose leafy meshes he could see
        That false pair's dalliance and badinage.
    2. (heraldry) To outline in black.''A cross entrailed.
      • 1847, Henry Gough, John Henry Parker, A Glossary of Terms Used in British Heraldry: With a Chronological Table ..., Oxford, Page 124,"Entrailed: outlined, always with black lines. See Adumbration, and Cross entrailed."
      • 1775, Hugh Clark, Thomas Wormull, An Introduction to Heraldry: Containing the Origin and Use of Arms; Rules ..., H. Washbourne, Page 122,"Entrailed, a Cross, P.7, n.20, Lee says, the colour need not be named, for it is always sable."

    Origin 2

    From Middle English entraille, from Old French entraille (cf. modern French entrailles), from Late Latin intrālia, modification of intrānea, contraction of Latin interāneum ("gut, intestine"), substantive of interāneus ("internal, inward")

    Noun

    entrail

    (plural entrails)
    1. (usually in the plural) An internal organ of an animal.
      • 1957, Bill Bryson, They Still Ride 'Em Rough, She might even bust an entrail if she went on a little farther in the official code
      • 1922-1976, w, Liam O'Flaherty: the collected stories‎ Chapter The Post Office, Those blackguards have no more respect for an entrail, or a sinew, or a vital organ, than if they were gutting dog-fish.
      • 2006, Robert Ludlum, The Ambler Warning‎, Did an entrail-reading priest find something nasty in the offal?
    2. (obsolete) Entanglement; fold.1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene‎, "About her cursed head, whose folds displaid
      Were stretcht now forth at length without entraile."
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