tail
IPA: tˈeɪɫ
noun
- (anatomy) The caudal appendage of an animal that is attached to its posterior and near the anus.
- An object or part of an object resembling a tail in shape, such as the thongs on a cat-o'-nine-tails.
- The back, last, lower, or inferior part of anything.
- The feathers attached to the pygostyle of a bird.
- The tail-end of an object, e.g. the rear of an aircraft's fuselage, containing the tailfin.
- The rear structure of an aircraft, the empennage.
- (astronomy) The visible stream of dust and gases blown from a comet by the solar wind.
- The latter part of a time period or event, or (collectively) persons or objects represented in this part.
- (statistics) The part of a distribution most distant from the mode; as, a long tail.
- One who surreptitiously follows another.
- (cricket) The lower order of batsmen in the batting order, usually specialist bowlers.
- (typography) The lower loop of the letters in the Roman alphabet, as in g, q or y.
- (chiefly in the plural) The side of a coin not bearing the head; normally the side on which the monetary value of the coin is indicated; the reverse.
- (mathematics) All the last terms of a sequence, from some term on.
- (now colloquial, chiefly US) The buttocks or backside.
- (slang) The penis of a person or animal.
- (slang, uncountable) Sexual intercourse.
- (kayaking) The stern; the back of the kayak.
- A train or company of attendants; a retinue.
- (anatomy) The distal tendon of a muscle.
- (entomology) A filamentous projection on the tornal section of each hind wing of certain butterflies.
- A downy or feathery appendage of certain achens, formed of the permanent elongated style.
- (surgery) A portion of an incision, at its beginning or end, which does not go through the whole thickness of the skin, and is more painful than a complete incision; called also tailing.
- One of the strips at the end of a bandage formed by splitting the bandage one or more times.
- (nautical) A rope spliced to the strap of a block, by which it may be lashed to anything.
- (music) The part of a note which runs perpendicularly upward or downward from the head; the stem.
- (mining) A tailing.
- (architecture) The bottom or lower portion of a member or part such as a slate or tile.
- (colloquial, dated) A tailcoat.
- (electrical engineering) Synonym of pigtail (“a short length of twisted electrical wire”)
- (law) Limitation of inheritance to certain heirs.
- (Chinese astronomy) A Chinese constellation coinciding with the tail of Scorpius, one of the 28 lunar mansions and the tail of Azure Dragon.
verb
- (transitive) To follow and observe surreptitiously.
- (architecture) To hold by the end; said of a timber when it rests upon a wall or other support; with in or into
- (nautical) To swing with the stern in a certain direction; said of a vessel at anchor.
- To follow or hang to, like a tail; to be attached closely to, as that which can not be evaded.
- To pull or draw by the tail.
adjective
- (law) Limited; abridged; reduced; curtailed.
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Examples of "tail" in Sentences
- The tail is not prehensile.
- It's the dog that wags the tail.
- The neck and the tail are thick.
- They become indistinct on the tail.
- In scorpions, the metasoma is the tail.
- The tail is covered by small prickles behind the spine.
- Behind the wings the fuselage tapered and became slender at the tail.
- The tail is short, and prehensile, tapering abruptly behind the vent.
- The male long tailed sylph carries characteristic elongated tail feathers.
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