| 释义 |
door-nail
A large-headed nail, with which doors were formerly studded for strength, protection, or ornamentation: now chiefly in the alliterative phr. as dead, deaf, dumb, dour, as a door-nail: see dead a. 32 b., deaf a. 1 d., etc.
(Conjectured by Todd to be ‘The nail on which in ancient doors the knocker struck’. No evidence of this appears.)
c1350[see dead a. 32 b]. 1350in Riley Lond. Mem. (1868) 262, 3000 dornail..7200 dornail. a1400–50Alexander 4747 Dom as a dore-nayle & defe was he bathe. 1593–1680 [see dead 32 b.]. 1854Mrs. Gaskell North & S. xvii, Thornton is as dour as a doornail. 1866Rogers Agric. & Prices I. 497 Door-nails, floor and roof-nails. |