tawse
English edit
Etymology edit
Apparently a plural form of taw, though attested earlier.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
tawse (plural tawses)
- (chiefly Scotland) A leather strap or thong which is split into (typically three) tails, used for corporal punishment in schools, applied to the palm of the hands or buttocks.
- 1919 March, W[illiam] B[utler] Yeats, “The Saint and the Hunchback”, in The Wild Swans at Coole, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC, pages 104–105:
- I lay about me with the taws
That night and morning I may thrash
Greek Alexander from my flesh, […]
Alternative forms edit
Verb edit
tawse (third-person singular simple present tawses, present participle tawsing, simple past and past participle tawsed)
- (transitive, chiefly Scotland) To beat with a tawse.
References edit
- Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, G.&C. Merriam Co., 1967
- Corpun.com, a specialized website on Corporal Punishments