Dictionary

billhook

Noun

billhook (plural billhooks)

(weapons) A medieval polearm with a similar construct, fitted to a long handle, sometimes with an L-shaped tine or a spike protruding from the side or the end of the blade for tackling the opponent; a bill
An agricultural implement often with a curved or hooked end to the blade used for pruning or cutting thick, woody plants.
- 1869, Richard D. Blackmore, Lorna Doone, chapter 38
  I worked very hard in the copse of young ash, with my billhook and a shearing-knife; cutting out the saplings where they stooled too close together, making spars to keep for thatching, wall-crooks to drive into the cob, stiles for close sheep hurdles, and handles for rakes, and hoes, and two-bills, of the larger and straighter stuff.
- 1887, Hardy, The Woodlanders, chapter 19:
  With a small billhook he carefully freed the collar of the tree from twigs and patches of moss which incrusted it to a height of a foot or two above the ground, an operation comparable to the "little toilet" of the executioner's victim.
Written as bill-hook: a part of the knotting mechanism in a reaper-binder or baler (agricultural machinery).
Written as bill hook: a spiked hook used in offices and shops for hanging bills or other small papers such as receipts.
(ornithology) Written as bill hook: a sharply pointed spike growing from the tip of the upper mandible of the hatchlings of honeyguides, used to destroy the eggs and kill the chicks of the host species.

Synonyms

handbill, pruning hook, hack, hacker, hedging bill, hedging-bill, hedge bill, bill, broom hook, block hook, Yorkshire bill, vine hook

Translations

Verb

billhook (billhooks, present participle billhooking; past and past participle billhooked)

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