| 释义 |
▪ I. iron, n.1|ˈaɪən|
Forms: α. 1 ísern. β. 1 ísen, 4 yzen, ysen, yse. γ. 1 íren, 2–6 iren, (3–5 irin, -un, -yn(e), 3–6 yren, (4–5 yrin, -un(ne, -yn(e), 4–7 yron, (5 eiren, eyren, iyron, hyrone, 6 yrone), 5– iron. δ. 3–7 (9 dial.) ire, yre, (3 eire), 6–7 yer-(monger). ε. (Chiefly north. and Sc.) 3–6 yrn, 4–6 yrne, 4–7 (9 dial.) irn(e, (5 irnne, herne, pl. yrnyss, 5–6 irness(e, 8–9 airn, ern. ζ. 5 ierne, iyrne, yirn, 5–6 yern(e, yeron, 6 yeirne, hierne.
[c gray][OE. íren, used beside ísern, ísen, = OFris. ísern, OS. îsarn (MDu. ijzen, ijzer, Du. ijzer), OHG. îsarn, later îsan (MHG., MLG. îsern, îsen, Ger. eisen), ON. ísarn (also later earn, jarn, Sw. järn, Da. jern), Goth. eisarn:—OTeut. type *īsarnom; cognate with OCelt. *īsarnom, whence Gaulish compounds in īsarno-, OIr. íarn (Ir. iaran, iarun, Gael. iarunn, Manx yiarn), OWelsh hearn (:—eharn, iharn:—ísarn), Corn. hoern, OBreton hoiarn, now houarn, pl. hern. The ulterior etymology of the Celto-Teut. īsarno- is uncertain; and the relationship of the various types in Eng. and the cognate languages involves many difficulties. The full Eng. type (= OHG., ON. ísarn) was ísern, found only in OE., though still in the 11th c. The form ísen, corresp. to later OHG. îsan, MHG. îsen, Ger. eisen, MDu. ijzen, extends from OE. to the 14th c. in Kentish and perh. other south. dial. (at length reduced to yse, also in the comb. ysmonger: see ironmonger). The Eng. type íren has no continental parallel; in OE., as a simple n., it was app. chiefly poetic, but it became the standard form in ME.; the second syllable was from the 14th c. variously spelt -en, -yn, -un, and from early in the 16th c. always -on, the prevalent 16th c. form being yron, on which iron gradually gained, and became universal about 1630. In early ME. southern dial., iren was reduced to ire, yre, found in literature in 15th c., and still the s.w. dialect form from Berkshire to Cornwall. In north. dial., on the other hand, iren was compressed to irn, yrn, still used as irn, irne, ern, airn, in Sc. and north. Eng. dial. (See Eng. Dialect Dict. s.v.) In the standard Eng. īren, īron, syncopation app. did not take place until after diphthongation of the ī, whence through a phonetic series (ˈiːrən[/c]), |ˈaɪrən|, |ˈaɪərən|, |ˈaɪər(ə)n|, |ˈaɪə(r)n|, came the existing |ˈaɪən|; cf. the syncopated pa. pples. born, borne, torn, worn, boln, swoln, and Sc. fal'n, fawn, from earlier boren, toren, woren, bollen, swollen, fallen. The 15–16th c. dial. spellings iern, yern, yirn, are ambiguous: in some cases they may have meant |ˈiːərn, ˈaɪərn|, in others yern, |jərn|, the latter prob. from Norse jarn, Da. jern. The plural yrnes, irnes (-ys, -esse, etc.) could arise alike from yrn, irn, or from yren, iren (as in heven, hevnes).
The form of the original īsarn has been much discussed; it has been viewed by some as a derivative, and perhaps adj. form, and suggestions made of its relation to ís ice (with the notion of ‘glancing’), or to L. æs, ær-, Goth. aiz, OHG. êr, OE. âr brass; but in neither case with much probability. Some class it among the Inde-eur. neuter words with r in nom.-acc., and -n in oblique cases (e.g. Skt. ˈūdhar gen. ˈūdhnas, L. femur, femin-is), and suppose an orig. nom. *ˈīsar, gen. *iˈsonos (yielding by Verner's Law *izan-az), whence the later forms in -r and -n, and (by contamination) -rn. The phonetic history of ON. jarn and its cognates is also doubtful. Grimm and others suggested a borrowing of OIr. íarn, giving ON. íarn, iárn, járn; others would derive it from izan- through eran, earn, jarn-. (See Möller in P. & B. Beiträge VII. 547; Noreen in Arkiv for Nordisk Filologi IV. 110 note, Abriss der urgerm. Lautlehre 195.) Uncertainty also attaches to the phonetic history of OE. íren whether it merely arose by rhotacism from ísen, or from ísern through an intermediate írern, shortened like berern, beren, cweartern, cwearten.]
1. a. A metal, the most abundant and useful of those used in the metallic state; very variously employed for tools, implements, machinery, constructions, and in many other applications.
Pure iron is soft and of a silver-white colour, but is scarcely known; the metal as commonly used has always an admixture of some other substance, usually carbon, and varies in colour from tin-white to dark grey. It is of three kinds, differing in the proportion of carbon present, and in properties: malleable iron, or wrought iron, which is comparatively soft, very tenacious, fusible only at a very high temperature, and capable at a red heat of being hammered or rolled into any required shape; cast iron, which is hard and brittle, and fusible at a lower temperature; and steel, which partakes of the properties of both. Iron is very rarely found native (the known instances being mostly of meteoric origin), but is obtained from its ores, which are chiefly oxides or salts of the metal. Chemically, iron is a metallic element: symbol Fe (ferrum); atomic weight, 56. In alchemy it was represented by the sign for the planet Mars ({male}).
αa700Epinal Gloss. 25 Alchior, isern [Erfurt Gloss., Alchior, isærn; Corpus Gloss., Alcion, isern]. c897K. ælfred Gregory's Past xxi. 163 Ðurh ðæt isern [is ᵹetacnod] ðæt mæᵹen ðara ðreatunga. c900tr. Bæda's Hist. i. Introd. (1890) 26 Hit is eac berende on wecga orum ares and isernes [MS. B. c 1050 irenes] leades and seolfres. a1000Cædmon's Gen. 1088 Siððan folca bearn æres cuðon and isernes..brucan.
βc940Laws of æthelstan ii. c. 14 in Schmid Gesetze, Þonne ga he to þam hatum isene. c1000Laws of æthelred iii. c. 6 ibid., ælc tiond aᵹe ᵹeweald swa hwæðer he wille swa wæter swa isen. c1000ælfric Deut. xxviii. 23 Si þe heofene swilce ar, and eorþe swilce isen. c1000Sax. Leechd. III. 30 Ne delfe..nan man þa moran mid isene. 1340Ayenb. 139 Þat nele naȝt sette ine gold, ac ine poure metal ase yzen. Ibid. 167 Moche þoleþ þe coupe of gold of strokes of yzen. 13..K. Alis. 5149 The kyng hete..Armen hem in breny of yse.
γa1000Cædmon's Gen. 383 Heardes irenes hate ᵹeslæᵹene grindlas greate. a1154O.E. Chron. an. 1137 And diden an scærp iren. c1250Gen. & Ex. 467 Of irin, of golde, siluer, and bras To sundren and mengen wis he was. a1300Cursor M. 7545 (Cott.) Noiþer irin [other MSS. iren] ne yeitt ne stile. 1340Hampole Pr. Consc. 6572 Dyngyng of devels hand, With melles of yren hate glowand. c1386Chaucer Prol. 500 If gold ruste, what shal Iren doo? 1388Wyclif Job xxviii. 2 Irun is takun fro erthe. a1400Sir Perc. 745 He was armede so wele In gude iryne and in stele. c1420Chron. Vilod. 4396 Gret gyus of hyrone y-leyde hym vpone. 1450–1530Myrr. our Ladye 58 In lyknesse of hotte brennynge yren. c1489Caxton Sonnes of Aymon vi. 136 Whan the yron is well hoote, hit werketh the better. c15111st Eng. Bk. Amer. (Arb.) Introd. 33/1 Nether harnayse, yrone, nor stele. 1530Palsgr. 235/1 Iron, fer. 1581Styward Mart. Discipl. i. 44 A good and sufficient peece, flaske, touch bore, pouder, shot, fier, yron. 1611Bible Deut. iii. 11 His bedsted was a bedsted of yron. 1617Hieron Wks. II 337 As yron by yron..so one man by another might be sharpened. 1677A. Yarranton Eng. Improv. 147 The best Iron in the known World, is in the Forest of Dean, and in the Clay-Hill in Shropshire. 1776Gibbon Decl. & F. ix. I. 236 It has been observed..that the command of iron soon gives a nation the command of gold. 1884W. H. Greenwood Iron & Steel 1 Chemically pure iron exists only as a curiosity and has no practical application in the arts.
δc1250Gen. & Ex. 2451 Noȝt sone deluen it wið yre. c1290S. Eng. Leg. I. 187/79 He let nime platus of Ire. 1297R. Glouc. (Rolls) 1171 Stakes of ire..he piȝte in temese grounde. 1387Trevisa Higden i. xli. (MS. Tib. D. vii.), Flaundres loueþ þe wolle of þis lond..Gaskuyn þe yre & þe leed. 1393Langl. P. Pl. C. i. 97 Boxes ben broght forþ I-bounden with yre. c1440Gesta Rom. i. lxix. 312 (Harl. MS.) And bond him in þe prison, with bondis of yre. 1474–5in Sarum Churchw. Acc. (ed. Swayne, 1896) 19 For ij plates of ire, iiijd. 1825Britton Beauties Wiltsh. III. Gloss., Ire, iron. 1886Elworthy W. Somerset Word-bk., Ire, iron..iron is the adjective form. Compare Iron-Bar with Bar-ire. Ibid., Ire gear, iron work generally.
εa1300Cursor M. 22207 Wit irne, or fire, or atter beist. 1306in Pol. Songs (Camden) 217 He wes y-fetered weel Both with yrn ant wyth steel. 1375Barbour Bruce x. 364 A cruk..Of Irn, that wes styth and square. c1400Apol. Loll. 86 Festining it wiþ irne þat it fal not. c1420Liber Cocorum (1862) 36 Rost hit on broche of irne. c1440York Myst. xxxiv. 96 Bragges Of irnne and stele full strange. a1450Mankind (Brandl 1898) 276 Lyke as þe smyth trieth erne in þe feere. 1549Compl. Scot. vi. 59 Quhen..marcus crassus, vas slane be the parthiens, the lyft did rane yrn. 1621G. Sandys Ovid's Met. xv. (1626) 311 To Brasse from Silver; and to Yr'ne from Brasse. 1816Scott Antiq. xxiii, Bits o' capper and horn and airn. 1826J. Wilson Noct. Ambr. Wks. 1855 I. 208 Like a great anvil..made o' wood instead o' airn. 1868Atkinson Cleveland Gloss., Airn, iron.
ζc1400Destr. Troy 9133 As pure watur pouret vn polishet yerin. Ibid. 10463 Barrit hom full bigly with boltes of yerne. 1447O. Bokenham Seyntys (Roxb.) 205 Wyth hookys of yirn. 1516in 10th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm. App. v. 397 Canvas, rossen, ropis, bordes, yerne, or yeirne, or any thinge elles to them belonginge. 1535in Weaver Wells Wills (1890) 51 A payre of wells bownd with yeron. 1545Joye Exp. Dan. iii. D vij, Golde, syluer, latyne, yerne. 1577Dee Relat. Spir. i. (1659) 167 A black box of yern.
b. with an and pl. A variety or sort of iron.
1858Greener Gunnery 194 If you wish to have a heavy single barrel made from Damascus, or any of the best irons. 1887D. A. Low Machine Draw. (1892) 77 The grey varieties of cast iron are called foundry irons..while the white varieties are called forge irons..from the fact that they are used for conversion into wrought iron.
c. Med. A preparation of iron or of some compound of it, used in medicine as a tonic.
[1753Chambers Cycl. Supp. s.v., Every preparation of Iron is both aperient and astringent in degree.] 1803Med. Jrnl. X. 186 It is cured by iron which has undergone no preparation, but the minutest division of its particles. 1831J. Davies Manual Mat. Med. 86 Iron and its different preparations are endowed with a very manifest tonic action. 1844–57G. Bird Urin. Deposits (ed. 5) 256 The headache occasionally following the use of iron is readily prevented. Mod. The girl is anæmic; she ought to take iron.
d. Geol. Any meteorite which contains a high proportion of iron.
1802[see stone n. 1 c]. 1842Amer. Jrnl. Sci. & Arts XLIII. 358 The imbedded grains of olivin in the Pallas iron of Siberia, and the Otampa iron of South America. 1868Geol. Mag. V. 75 The bodies which are comprised under the general name of meteorites have long since been arranged under two great divisions, the irons and the stones. 1920Mineral. Mag. XIX. 56 In this scheme [of the author], meteorites are divided into four classes, viz. Irons, Stony-irons, Chondritic Stones, and Non-chondritic Stones. 1962B. Mason Meteorites ix. 130 In total mass the iron meteorites far outweigh the stones, since all large meteorites are irons, and the average mass of an iron is much greater than that of a stone. 1971I. G. Gass et al. Understanding Earth viii. 116/1 The basic division [of meteorites] into irons, stony-irons, and stones is simple and straightforward.
2. a. With defining attribute: see also bar- (n.1 30), bog- (n.1), cast-, pig-, wrought-iron, etc.
white iron: see quot. 1881; also popularly applied to tinned iron.
1632Lithgow Trav. v. 205 Joynd in three parts, with Lead or white Iron. 1665D. Dudley Met. Martis (1851) 32 The Author did sell pigg or Cast Iron made with Pit coal at four pounds per Tun. 1745De Foe's Eng. Tradesm. xlv. (1841) II. 165 Tin plates, single and double, called White Iron, from Saxony. 1795Pearson in Phil. Trans. LXXXV. 343 Varieties..differently named by artizans, namely..pig, or sow iron; blue, gray, white cast iron;—soft iron; tough iron; brittle iron; hard iron. 1841H. Miller O.R. Sandst. viii. (1842) 184 Bog iron, and the clay ironstone, so abundant in the Coal Measures. 1881Raymond Mining Gloss. s.v., Wrought-iron, also called bar-iron and weld-iron, is the product of the forge or the puddling furnace, cast-iron of the blast furnace... Gray forge or mill-iron..mottled (spotted with white iron), and white (hard, brittle, radially crystalline, containing its carbon mostly in alloy with the iron, and showing no visible graphite)... So-called silver-gray, glazy, or carbonized iron is usually an iron rendered brittle by excess of silicon.
3. In figurative uses, as a type of extreme hardness or strength.
1612–15Bp. Hall Contempl., O.T. xviii. iv, This load⁓stone..shall draw to us even hearts of iron. 1613Shakes. Hen. VIII, iii. ii. 425 Beare witnesse, all that haue not hearts of Iron. 1695Temple Hist. Eng., He had a Body of Iron, as well as a Heart of Steel. 1858Longfellow M. Standish i, Short of stature he was,..deep-chested, with muscles and sinews of iron. 1873R. Broughton Nancy III. 238 Embraced in the icy iron of his [Death's] arms.
4. a. An instrument, appliance, tool, utensil, or particular part of one, made of the metal. (Often with defining word prefixed, as curling-iron, grappling-iron, etc.: see these words.)
a700Epinal Gloss. 883 Scalbellum, bredisern [Erfurt Gloss., Scabellum, bred isærn]. c897K. ælfred Gregory's Past. xxvi. 185 Sua se læce hyd his isern wið ðone monn ðe he sniðan wile. c1000Sax. Leechd. III. 4 Se man..nime..healswyrt and isenheardan butan ælcan isene ᵹenumen. 1297R. Glouc. (Rolls) 6950 Heo stap vpe þis furi yre, euerich stape al clene. 13..S.E. Leg. (MS. Bodl. 779) in Herrig's Archiv LXXXII. 311/197 Þe man nom his yrin & to þe brigge it drowȝ. c1400Mandeville (Roxb.) x. 39 Of ane of þase nayles gert..Constantyne make him ane yrne till his brydill. c1400Lanfranc's Cirurg. (MS. B.) 133 Þat he mowe noȝt here þe sonn of þe eyren þat trepanyth. c1420Pallad. on Husb. i. 136 Thyn yrons..For graffyng and for kittynge. 1463–4Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees) 153 Pro factura de le Milne Yrennys. 1523Fitzherb. Husb. §3 It must be wel steeled, and that shall cause..the yrens to laste moche lenger. 1563Edin. City Rec. 26 Sept. in Ann. Scott. Printing xv. (1890) 156 The said Ihonne had na vtheris guddis saifing his prenting irnis and letteris. 1611Bible Job xli. 7 Canst thou fill his skinne with barbed irons? 1703Moxon Mech. Exerc. 66 When you set the Iron of the Fore-Plane. 1748F. Smith Voy. Disc. I. 41 note, With an Ice-Hook, which is an iron shaped like an S. 1824Longfellow Woods in Winter iv, Shrilly the skater's iron rings. 1837Thackeray Ravenswing i, A little more of the iron to the left whisker. c1850Rudim. Navig. (Weale) 126 Irons, the tools used by the caulkers for driving in the oakum. 1875Carpentry & Join. 25 Under the supposition that the iron..projects equally its entire breadth below the sole of the plane.
b. esp. An iron instrument used for branding or cauterizing; a brand-iron.
c1380Wyclif Wks. (1880) 303 Brent wiþ hoot yren of coueytise. c1400Mandeville (Roxb.) xxi. 93 Þe folk of þis cuntree gers merk þam in þe visage with a hate yrne. 1541Act 33 Hen. VIII, c. 12 §6 To..make..a fire of coles, and there to make redy searynge yrons. 1611Bible 1 Tim. iv. 2 Hauing their conscience seared with a hote iron. 1613Purchas Pilgrimage (1614) 768 The women with an Iron pounce and race their bodies, legs..and armes, in curious knots. 1856Mrs. Browning Aur. Leigh ii. 699 As guiltless men may feel The felon's iron..and scorn the mark Of what they are not.
†c. pl. Dies used in striking coins. Obs.
Clerk of the Irons, an officer of the Royal Mint who had charge of the manufacture and use of the dies; in 1815 merged in the Superintendent of machinery.
1483in Attorney-General's Rep. Mint Officers, John Shaa, graver of the coining irons of gold and silver within England and Calais. 1540Sc. Acts Jas. V (1814) II. 378/2 All personis þat..counterfutis þe kingis Irnis of cunȝe. 1566in Harl. MS. 698, lf. 120 Robert Hornby, Clerk of the Irons. 1656Cromwell in Antiq. Rep. (1808) II. 408 The office of Sole-chiefe Engraver of the irons of and for the moneyes of us and our successors. 1663Mint Records, Puncheons, matrices, stamps and Dyes, or any Irons for Coyning. 1706Phillips, Clerk of the Irons, an Officer in the Mint, who is to take care that the Irons be clean and fit to work with. 1848W. Wyon Evidence bef. Commission, The Superintendent, as Clerk of the irons, keeps an account of all blank dies.
d. Whaling, etc. A harpoon. (= harping-iron.)
1674tr. Martiniere's Voy. N. Countries 115 One of our Shallops coming too near the other Fish before they threw out their Irons. 1697W. Dampier Voy. I. 37 Striking Instruments, as Harpoons, Fish hooks, and Tortoise-Irons. 1853Househ. Words 8 Jan. 400 The harpoon or ‘iron’ as we whalers call it. Ibid. 401 Both irons are buried in the whale.
e. Golf. A golf-club having an iron head which is more or less laid back in order to loft the ball: see quot. 1890.
1857Chambers's Inform. II. 694/1 The sand-iron comes into play when the ball lies in a ‘bunker’, or sand-pit. Ibid., When a ball lies in whins or other hazards of a similar nature..the iron is the best club for freeing it from such impediments. Ibid. 696/1 Some few golfers put almost exclusively with a metal club, an iron or cleek, to wit. 1890H. Hutchinson Golf (Badm. Libr.) 64 There are heavy irons and light irons, driving irons, lofting irons, and sand irons. 1894Times 5 Mar. 7/5 His opponent used the iron well and played a very good short game.
f. slang. A portable fire-arm; a pistol.
1836W. H. Maxwell Capt. Blake III. xi, Take care and have the marking irons in your pocket. 1888J. Inglis Tent Life Tigerland 288 Once again..our shooting irons spoke, adding still another quota to the bag. 1889Boldrewood Robbery under Arms xxxvii, Put down your irons..or..we'll drop ye where ye stand.
g. slang. Money. Cf. iron-man 1 c and d.
1785Grose Dict. Vulgar T., Iron, money in general. 1906E. Pugh Spoilers i. 5 The iron you're goin' to give me. 1966C. Rougvie Gredos Reckoning iii. 50 He was earning a bit of iron.
h. pl. Iron supports to correct bow-legs, etc.
1838Dickens Nich. Nick. (1839) viii. 67 Children..with irons upon their limbs, boys of stunted growth. 1884W. Pye Surg. Handicraft xxv. 319 Wooden splints are..preferable to ‘irons’. 1927W. E. Collinson Contemp. Eng. 56 We could see..deformities due to rickets or injuries and the remedies e.g. irons to correct bow-legs.
i. (Usu. in pl.) A stirrup. Cf. stirrup-iron 1.
1894Country Gentleman's Catal. 173 Saddles..with girths, stirrup leathers and irons, complete. 1907Yesterday's Shopping (1969) 304 Gentleman's spring-side safety irons, with Prussian sides. 1955Times 30 June 3/7 He bumped Gawthorpe badly, causing Nevett to stand up quickly in his irons. 1963E. H. Edwards Saddlery xix. 145 There are two main variations of the basic iron which are the Bent Top iron..and the Kournakoff. 1969D. M. Goodall tr. Müller's Pocket Dict. Horseman's Terms 70 Stirrup/irons, der Steigbügel.
j. pl. Eating utensils. dial. and slang.
1905Eng. Dial. Dict. Suppl., Irons... Cum. Knife and fork, in phr. to be a good fist with one's irons, to have a good appetite. 1943in Hunt & Pringle Service Slang 40. 1946 J. Irving Royal Navalese 97 Irons (eating irons), the sailor's name for his knife, fork and spoon.
k. slang. An old motor vehicle.
1935Sun (N.Y.) 19 Feb. 28/1 ‘Iron’ is the dealer's name for an obsolete [automobile]. 1961J. Stroud Touch & Go xi. 105 ‘This iron of yours ―’ began Frank. 1963Amer. Speech XXXVIII. 42 Iron, an old truck. 1967M. Reynolds After Some Tomorrow 9 Well, it would mean being able to maintain a decent hovercar rather than the..four wheel iron he was currently driving.
l. Used as a form of currency in Sierra Leone.
1936G. Greene Journey without Maps i. iii. 64 One could speculate in irons: the rate that day was twenty for fourpence.
m. slang. A jemmy used in housebreaking.
1941‘V. Davis’ Phenomena in Crime xix. 251 The bishop, cane, iron, or stick. 1962John o' London's 25 Jan. 82/1 Tools for breaking into other people's premises are irons.
5. esp. An implement of iron used when heated to smooth out linen, to press down the seams of cloth, etc.; defined according to shape and structure, as box-iron, flat-iron, Italian-iron, etc. In recent use: an electric iron (see electric a. 2 b).
1613J. May Declar. Est. Clothing v. 27 With a wet cloth and a hotte Iron, they ouerrunne those lists. 1769Pub. Advertiser 18 May 3/4 To be sold by Auction great variety of Box Irons and Flat Irons. 1833J. Holland Manuf. Metal II. 253 Dealers commonly distinguish these useful implements by the terms ‘sad iron’, ‘box iron’, and ‘Italian iron’. 1840Dickens Old C. Shop x, [She] came to the fire-place for another iron.
6.
†a. An iron weapon; a sword. Obs.
b. Used (without an and pl.) in various allusive expressions referring to warfare or slaughter. Cf. F. fer.
Beowulf (Z.) 893 Ðæt swurd..dryhtlic iren. c1000Sax. Leechd. I. 132 Wið sleᵹe isernes oððe stenges þeos ylce wyrt..wundurlice ᵹehæleþ. a1300Cursor M. 23468 (Cott.) It mai nan iren o þam bite. c1340Ibid. 26924 Quilis þat irene is in wounde is plaster nane mai make hit sounde. 1387Trevisa Higden (Rolls) V. 219 [Alaric] destroyed al..wiþ yre and wiþ fuyre [L. ferro et igne]. 1494Fabyan Chron. v. cxiii. 87 Wastynge & destroyinge the countrey with fyre and irne. 1601Shakes. Twel. N. iii. iv. 276 Meddle you must that's certain, or forsweare to weare iron about you. 1608D. T. Ess. Pol. & Mor. 66 b, To make way..through fieldes of Iron, and streames of blood, to that imperiall dignitie. 1639T. Brugis tr. Camus' Moral Relat. 211 Such biting replyes..that..hee would have sought to redresse it with an iron. 1665Sir T. Herbert Trav. (1677) 131 Undertakes to make the Turk eat cold Iron. 1871R. Ellis Catullus lxiv. 355 Charge Troy's children afield and fell them grimly with iron. 1898Daily News 1 Aug. 4/7 Bismarck..is known throughout the world as ‘the man of blood and iron’. The phrase was his own. Great questions (he said) are decided, not by speeches and majorities, but by iron and blood (1862).
7. a. An iron shackle or fetter; usually in pl. Most freq. in phr. in irons, said of a person having the feet or hands fettered. Formerly also, less definitely, in iron, in bonds, in captivity. Cf. F. fers.
c825Vesp. Psalter cvi[i]. 10 ᵹebundne in weðelnisse & irene. a1000Ags. Ps. (Th.) cvi. 9 ᵹebundene bealuwe feterum..and on iserne [ferro]. 1340Ayenb. 128 Þe ilke þet is ine prisone in ysnes and ine ueteres. 1377Langl. P. Pl. B. iv. 85 Þe kynge..comaunded a constable to casten hym in yrens. c1400Destr. Troy 3523 The kyng..ffor hir tales of truthe teghit her in yernes. c1489Caxton Sonnes of Aymon xvi. 369 And thenne he made to be broughte a grete payre of yrens, and fetred hym wyth theym, bothe hys fete togyder. 1533Bellenden Livy iii. (1822) 225 Virginius commandit the serjand to apprehend Ceso, and put him in irnis. 1539Bible (Great) Ps. cvii. 10 Soch as syt in darcknesse & in the shadow of death, beyng fast bound in mysery & yron. 1588Greene Pandosto (1607) 46 Pained with the burden of cold and heauie Irons. 1611Bible Ps. cv. 18 Ioseph..Whose feete they hurt with fetters: he was layd in iron. 1653H. Cogan tr. Pinto's Trav. xxxii. 126 The Jaylors clapt irons on our feet, and manacles on our hands. 1676tr. Guillatiere's Voy. Athens 272 They clapt him in irons. 1726G. Shelvocke Voy. round World 26 He would see the ring-leaders..punish'd..carrying them home in irons. 1790Burns Tam O' Shanter 131 A murderer's banes in gibbet airns. 1849Macaulay Hist. Eng. v. I. 562 When the Earl reached the Castle his legs were put in irons, and he was informed that he had but a few days to live. 1884Pae Eustace 124 Boatswain, if those fellows make any more noise, have them taken below and put in irons.
b. Phr. ‘The iron entered into his soul’, Lat. ferrum pertransiit animam ejus, Ps. civ. (cv.) 18, a mistranslation in the Vulgate of the Heb. (lit. ‘his person entered into the iron’, i.e. fetters, chains) followed by the earlier Eng. versions (but not in that of 1611—see above), which has passed into fig. use to express the impression made by captivity, affliction, or hard usage, upon the very ‘soul’ or inner being of the sufferer.
c825Vesp. Psalter civ. 18 Iren ðorhleorde sawle his. a1340Hampole Psalter civ. 17 Yryn passid thorgh his saule. 1388Wyclif Ps. civ. [cv.] 18 Thei maden lowe hise [Joseph's] feet in stockis, irun passide by his soule. 1539Bible (Great) Ps. cv. 18 Whose fete they hurt in the stockes: the yron entred in to hys soule. 1768Sterne Sent. Journ. (1778) II. 32 (Captive), I saw the iron enter into his soul. 1843Macaulay Ess., Mad. D'Arblay (1865) II. 304/2 She was sinking into a slavery worse than that of the body. The iron was beginning to enter into the soul.
c. fig. (Naut.) A square-rigged vessel is said to be in irons when, the yards being so braced that some sails are laid aback in coming up into the wind, she will not ‘cast’ or turn either way.
1832Marryat N. Forster xxii, The yards would not swing round;..and the ship was in irons. Ibid. xlix, The pirate..not having been expeditious in trimming his sails, laid in irons, as seamen term it, heeling over to the blast. 1846Raikes Life Sir J. Brenton 371 Neither helm or sails had any power over the ships, which were to use the common phrase..completely in irons. 1897M. Kingsley W. Africa 350, I was in a canoe that made such audaciously bad tacks, missed stays, got into irons, and in general behaved in a way that ought to have lost her captain his certificate.
8. = iron-shrub: see 15.
1756P. Browne Jamaica 179 The slender reclining Iron. This beautiful little plant rises generally in an oblique direction.
9. = corrugated iron. Austral. and N.Z.
1924‘R. Daly’ Outpost iii. 28 The Residency was a large iron-and-weatherboard bungalow. 1944D. Stewart in D. M. Davin N.Z. Short Stories (1953) 270 We sat for hours..listening to the rain hammering on the iron roof. 1948V. Palmer Golconda x. 73 Her banter usually glanced off Neda like hail from an iron roof. 1956G. Bowen Wool Away! (ed. 2) x. 115 Building paper should be used under the iron above the shearing board.
10. Ellipt. form of iron hoof, rhyming slang for ‘poof’, a homosexual.
1936J. Curtis Gilt Kid viii. 79 You gets into bed and goes straight off to kip, never touched me you didn't, you great iron. 1938J. Phelan Lifer iv. 39 Harry had a young iron an' Painter butted in on him. 1961Partridge Adventuring among Words xii. 58 Gorblimey, 'e's an iron, did'n yeh know?
11. Theatr. slang. Ellipt. form of iron curtain 1.
1951R. Southern in Oxf. Compan. Theatre 171/2 Another curtain in the proscenium opening is the Safety or Fireproof Curtain, sometimes nicknamed the Iron. 1952Granville Dict. Theatr. Terms 102 Iron's down. 1967N. Marsh Death at Dolphin v. 112 ‘I'll take the Iron up and you can see Jeremy Jones's set for the first act.’ He..sent up the elegantly painted fireproof curtain.
12. Phrases.
a. to strike while (when) the iron is hot, or at its highest heat: to act at the appropriate time.
b. to have (or put) many (too many, etc.) irons in the fire: (a) to have or be engaged in (too) many occupations or undertakings; (b) to have or use several expedients or alternatives to attain a purpose. to put (or lay) every iron (or all irons) in the fire: to try every means.
c. fresh (or new) off the irons: fresh from school or studies; newly made or prepared; brand-new.
a.c1386Chaucer Melib. ⁋70 Right so as whil that Iren is hoot men sholden smyte. 1523St. Papers Hen. VIII, IV. 85 And now the iron is hote, it is tyme to stryke. 1612–15Bp. Hall Contempl., O.T. xviii. vii, The iron was now hot with this heavenly fire; Elijah..strikes immediately. 1615Chapman Odyss. xii. 487 [He] their iron strook At highest heat. 1753Foote Eng. in Paris i. (1763) 13 Then strike while the Iron's hot.
b.1549Sir W. Paget Let. to Somerset 7 July (P.R.O., St. Pap. Dom. Edw. VI, VIII. No. 4), Put no more so many yrons in the fyre at ones. 1579–80North Plutarch (1676) 602 Now Pompey..under-hand did lay all the irons in the fire he could to bring it to pass. 1621Burton Anat. Mel. iii. iv. i. ii. (1651) 393/2 He [the Pope] hath more actors in his Tragædy, more irons in the fire. 1624Capt. Smith Virginia iv. 159 They that have many Irons in the fire, some must burne. c1645Howell Lett. (1650) I. ii. xv. 89 That King..having too many irons in the fire at his own home. 1721Kelly Scot. Prov. 255 Many Irons in the Fire, some must cool. 1728Vanbr. & Cib. Prov. Husb. ii. i. 44 Man. Is it full as practicable as what you have told me? Sir Fran. Ay..you'll find that I have more Irons i' th' Fire than one! 1751R. Paltock P. Wilkins (1884) II. xv. 156, I had now several important irons in the fire, and all to be struck whilst hot. 1762Smollett Sir L. Greaves iii. (1793) I. 62 Anthony Darnel had begun to canvass, and was putting every iron in the fire. 1852A. Gray Lett. (1893) 391 College work is now over and I can get on with fewer irons in the fire. 1886Overton Evang. Revival 18th C. vii. 118 [He] had far too many irons in the fire to find time for original research. 188719th Cent. Aug. 240 The State..cannot add to its other irons the supervision of all that is interesting in art and architecture.
c.1683A. D. Art Converse 25 Young and unexperienced..as they say commonly, fresh off the Irons. 1808–80Jamieson, New aff the irnes, a phrase used with respect to one who has recently finished his studies.
13. attrib. Of or pertaining to iron: cf. iron a.
1530Palsgr. 235/1 Iron ruste, ferrvge. 1638Sir T. Herbert Trav. (ed. 2) 235 Few of them know how to read, Bellona trayning them up in iron dances. 1756(title) The Case of the Importation of Bar Iron from our own Colonies of North America; humbly recommended to the consideration of the present Parliament, by the Iron Manufacturers of Great Britain. 1785W. Gibbons Reply Sir L. O'Brien title-p., The present state of the Iron Trade between England and Ireland. 1854Ronalds & Richardson Chem. Technol. (ed. 2) I. 235 The mode of applying the hot blast to lead and iron smelting. 1868–72Watts Dict. Chem. V. 386 In the green portion alone, there exist no fewer than 70 bright iron lines. 1873Dawson Earth & Man vi. 110 Peroxide of iron or iron rust. 1884Pall Mall G. 23 Sept. 8/2 The Iron and Steel Institute met at Chester this morning. 1896Daily News 21 Oct. 2/7 The Blackburn iron trade strike was settled..yesterday afternoon. 1897M. Kingsley W. Africa 64 The Bubi is not only unlearned in iron lore, but he was learned in stone.
14. General Combinations.
a. attrib., as iron-bond, iron-borings, iron-dross, iron-filings, iron-furnace, iron-gear, iron-hail, iron-vein, etc. (sense 1 c) iron pill, iron tablet, iron tonic.
b. obj. and obj. gen., as iron-containing, iron-digesting, iron-eating, iron-producing, iron-using, etc., adjs.; iron-drawing, iron-forging, iron-mining, iron-puddling, iron-smelting ns.; iron-heater, iron-holder, iron-moulder, iron-planer, iron-puddler, iron-turner, etc., ns.c. instrumental, as iron-braced, iron-branded, iron-burnt, iron-clenched, iron-fastened, iron-guarded, iron-marked, iron-sheathed, iron-stained, iron-strapped, iron-teeming, etc., adjs.; iron-crust vb. See also iron-bound, -cased, -clad, etc.
d. similative, esp. with adjs. of colour: = like iron, as iron-black, iron-blue, iron-grey; or = like iron-rust, as iron-brown, iron-red. Also iron-coloured, iron-like. (See also iron a. 2, iron-hard, etc.)
1868Dana Min. (ed. 5) 144 Paracolumbite is an *iron-black mineral.
1494–5in Swayne Churchw. Acc. Sarum (1896) 43 Michaeli Smyth pro..emendacione de lez *Ironbondes iiijd.
1874Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 423 A pretty good price is paid for the *iron-borings.
1590Spenser F.Q. ii. v. 7 Hurling high his *yron braced arme.
c1400Apol. Loll. 103 Hauing þer consciens *iren brondit.
1610Holland Camden's Brit. i. 84 Those *yron-brent markes in Picts now seene all bloodlesse as they die.
1851S. Judd Margaret i. xiv. (Ward & Lock) 110 The horned-pout, with its pearly iridine breast and *iron-brown back.
1874Thearle Naval Archit. 135 The joint..in the bolt hole is *iron-caulked.
1823Scott Quentin D. xxviii, A strong *iron-clenched door admitted them.
1693Lond. Gaz. No. 2843/4 He wears a French *Iron coloured Drugget Coat. 1730A. Gordon Maffei's Amphith. 351 The red Iron-coloured, and yellow Coverings of the Theatre. 1843A. Bethune Sc. Fireside Stor. 5 His complexion had in it..little of that dusky hue which, for want of a better name, has been called iron coloured. 1849D. G. Rossetti Let. 27 Sept. (1965) I. 61 The iron-coloured sea. 1909S. W. Bushell Chinese Art (ed. 2) II. viii. 26 Bowls and cups with iron-coloured feet and brown mouths.
1901Brit. Med. Jrnl. 23 Nov. 1540/1 It also revealed a yellowish-brown *iron-containing substance within the primitive nuclei of red globules. 1926Jrnl. Biol. Chem. LXX. 474 The amounts of iron-containing supplements to be fed. 1946Nature 12 Oct. 516/2 The intensification due to the formation of the iron-containing complex would increase the slope of the density/concentration curves at the lower concentrations of molybdenum.
1599Nashe Lenten Stuffe (1871) 60 It will embrawn and *iron-crust his flesh.
a1716South Serm. II. x. (R.), Such an *iron-digesting faith have they.
1620T. Granger Div. Logike 66 Heate is the essentiall propertie of fire, *yron⁓drawing, of the loadstone.
1796H. Hunter St. Pierre's Stud. Nat. (1799) I. 124 Look at the anfractuosities of a simple morsel of *iron-dross.
a1631Drayton Noah's Flood Wks. (1748) 464/1 The *iron-eating ostrich.
1858Simmonds Dict. Trade s.v., Vessels whose planks and timbers are rivetted with iron nails and bolts instead of copper, are said to be *iron-fastened.
1772Priestley in Franklin's Wks. (1887) IV. 489 A mixture of *iron filings and brimstone.
1839Carlyle Chartism viii. 168 The Saxon kindred burst forth into cotton-spinning..*iron-forging.
1874Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 332 An ironmine in this region is not deemed of any value..not an *iron-furnace has been built.
1871Palgrave Lyr. Poems 103 Across the *iron-furrow'd way.
1477–8in Swayne Churchw. Acc. Sarum (1896) 22 Pro ferramento vocato le *yregere. 1886Elworthy W. Somerset Word-bk. 372 Ire gear..would mean all kinds of ironmongery, and completed iron-work.
c1820S. Rogers Italy (1839) 187 No strangers to the *iron-hail of war.
1858Simmonds Dict. Trade, *Iron⁓heater, the piece of metal which is heated in the fire for a laundress's box-iron or Italian-iron.
Ibid., *Iron-holder , a stand for a laundress's smoothing-iron.
1896‘M. Field’ Attila ii. 49 He shall be scourged With the *iron-knotted lash they use for slaves.
1577tr. Bullinger's Decades (1592) 301 We Christians haue nothing to do with the *yronlike philosophy since our Lorde..vtterly condemned it. 1908Daily Chron. 17 Sept. 6/3 The discipline is as iron-like as ever. 1963Times 25 Feb. 5/7 Shepherds with Byzantine, iron-like faces protect their flocks against the wolves.
1674Lond. Gaz. No. 896/4 Run away..a Blackamoor Man..*Iron-marked in his Brest with the sign of a Greyhound. 1710Ibid. No. 4680/4 A dark Bay Gelding..with a T Iron-mark'd on the near Buttock.
1877Hewitt in Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 365 The commencement of *iron-mining at Lake Superior, about the year 1856.
1879Family Physician 809 This condition, known as chlorosis or green sickness, is readily controlled by the use of iron... The systematic use of the *iron pills is almost invariably attended with the most satisfactory results. 1912More Secret Remedies (B.M.A.) 203 The pills were..a form of Blaud's pill, somewhat weaker than the official iron pill.
1863P. Barry Dockyard Econ. 127 England is an *iron-producing and iron-manufacturing country.
1871Athenæum 15 July 85 There is not any labour so severe as that of the *iron-puddler.
1820D. Wordsworth Jrnl. 11 Aug. (1941) II. 125 Its crags of grey and *iron-red hues. 1909S. W. Bushell Chinese Art (ed. 2) II. viii. 29 Coral or iron-red (fan hung). 1974Country Life 3/10 Jan. 10/1 Asil game cocks..head and breast enamelled with iron-red flecks over a wash of rouge-de-fer.
1695Woodward Nat. Hist. Earth iv. (1723) 198 Crystallised Ores, and Minerals, e.g. the *Iron-Rhombs, the Tin Grains.
1884J. Parker Apost. Life III. 258 A gate iron-bound and *iron-riveted.
1645Boate Ireland's Nat. Hist. (1652) 127 The *Iron-rock being full of joints, is with pick-axes easily divided.
1820Scott Abbot iii, She rushed to him, clasped his *iron-sheathed frame in her arms.
1876Meredith in Fortn. Rev. 1 June 829 A shape in stone, Sword-hacked and *iron-stained. 1915E. R. Lankester Diversions of Naturalist vii. 63 A few only iron-stained and yellow.
1957Brit. Nat. Formulary (B.M.A.) (ed. 4) 147 Ferrous Carbonate Tablets, B.P.C. Synonyms: Blaud's tablets: *iron tablets.
1777–8R. Potter æschylus (1779) I. 28 (Jod.) And land upon this *iron-teeming earth.
1861J. G. Sheppard Fall Rome iii. 140 The *iron-tipped arrows flew in clouds.
1933E. C. Pearce Short Encycl. for Nurses 24 Good nourishing food,..combined with the use of *iron tonics, is all that is necessary. 1973J. Porter It's Murder with Dover ix. 88 Getting her daughter to take a dose of iron tonic.
1865Tylor Early Hist. Man. ix. 247 The *iron-using races of Southern Africa.
1879Sir. G. Campbell White & Black 243 The best *iron-veins are..a good deal worked-out.
15. a. Special Combinations: iron bacterium, any of various bacteria, found esp. in fresh water, which are capable of oxidizing ferrous salts to ferric hydroxide (perhaps obtaining energy thereby) and storing the end product in their structure; iron-binding a., able to combine chemically with iron; n., combination with iron; also attrib.; iron buff, hydrated ferric oxide used as a dye for cotton by impregnating the cloth with a soluble iron salt, passing it through an alkali solution, and oxidizing; iron-cement, a kind of very hard cement; iron-clay a., of mixed iron and clay; iron-cloth, chain-mail, esp. as made in modern times for cleaning greasy vessels; iron deficiency, insufficient iron in an organism or in its food; also attrib., so iron-deficient adj.; iron-fall, a fall of meteoric iron; iron-free a., free from or destitute of iron; † proof against the force of iron; iron gang Austral., a gang of prisoners working in irons; iron-grass, a local name for knot-grass (Polygonum aviculare), also for Aira cæspitosa and species of Carex (Britten & H.); iron-liquor, ‘a solution of acetate of iron, used as a mordant by calico-printers’ (Simmonds Dict. Trade 1858); iron loss Electr. = core-loss (core n.1 16); iron-maker, a manufacturer of iron; so iron-making vbl. n.; † iron-mill, a place where bar-iron is made; iron mountain, a mountain rich in iron ore; iron period Archæol. = Iron Age 2; iron play Golf, a specified manner of playing with irons (sense 4 e); so iron player; iron ration, (a) (usu. pl.) an emergency ration of tinned food, esp. as provided in the armed services; (b) various extended and fig. uses; iron-saw, a circular saw for cutting hot iron; iron-scale = hammer-scale (see hammer n.1 7); iron shot Golf, a shot made with an iron; iron-shrub, a name for Sauvagesia erecta, also called herb of St. Martin; iron-sponge, spongy iron, iron in a loose state with little cohesion: see sponge; iron-stain, a stain (on cloth, etc.) produced by iron-rust or tincture of iron, or a similar stain produced on a plant by a fungus; iron-stand, a stand on which to place a heated iron (see 5); iron-strap (Whaling) = foreganger 2 a (see 4 d); iron-yellow, a bright yellow pigment prepared from oxide of iron; Mars yellow. See also Iron Age (2), etc.
1888Jrnl. R. Miscrosc. Soc. 786 Bacteria which assume a rust-coloured hue were denominated *iron-bacteria by Ehrenberg. Ibid., The oxidizing power of the cells of iron-bacteria must be extremely great. 1919D. Ellis (title) Iron bacteria. 1945Science 23 Nov. 533/1 It seems unreasonable..to conclude that an organism is an iron bacterium or that it is developing as an iron bacterium unless there are far greater quantities of ferric hydrate than cell substance in the accumulated materials resulting from bacterial growth. 1955K. V. Thimann Life of Bacteria xxi. 598 The iron bacteria are of two types, unicellular and multicellular.
1946Science 11 Oct. 340/1 (heading) An *iron-binding component in human blood plasma. 1949Arch. Biochem. XX. 170 (heading) Carbon dioxide and oxygen in complex formation with iron and siderophilin, the iron-binding component of human plasma. Ibid. 172 (heading) On the mode of iron binding by siderophilin. 1970Clin. Chem. XVI. 148/1 An automated method has been developed for determining serum iron-binding capacity.
1902Encycl. Brit. XXVII. 564/1 *Iron Buff is produced by impregnating the cotton with a solution of ferrous sulphate, squeezing, passing into sodium hydrate or carbonate solution, and finally exposing to air. 1925S. R. & E. R. Trotman Bleaching, Dyeing & Chem. Technol. Textile Fibres xxxiii. 517 Iron buffs are fast to light, washing, and alkalis, but are sensitive to acids. 1971R. J. Adrosko Nat. Dyes & Home Dyeing 49 While one might deduce correctly that iron buff would not necessarily produce a lively color, it was expected to last for the life of the textile.
1825J. Nicholson Operat. Mechanic 617 Detached ornaments..fixed upon the ceiling, &c. with white-lead, or with the composition known by the name of *iron-cement.
1772Fletcher Logica Genev. 103 Uncovering the two *iron-clay feet of your great image.
1855Hewitt Anc. Armour I. 238 Beneath the..chain-mail was worn a coif of softer material, to mitigate the roughness of the *iron-cloth.
1923Biochem. Jrnl. XVII. 205 The result was that the symptoms and effects of *iron deficiency as described appeared in the pigs. 1929Trans. & Proc. N.Z. Inst. Mar. 51 The theory..that iron deficiency in the pasture was the cause of ‘Bush Sickness’, was finally adopted. 1956Nature 18 Jan. 336/1 Metal-induced iron-deficiency in crop plants. 1971Brit. Med. Bull. XXVII. 6/2 The detection of iron deficiency anaemia by measuring the haemoglobin content of the blood. Ibid. 32/1 Iron deficiency is believed to be common in Great Britain in adult women of all ages.
1932Biol. Abstr. VI. 792/1 ‘Salt sick’ of cattle on certain *iron-deficient sandy and residual soils has proved to be a nutritional anemia due to deficiency of Fe, or of Fe and Cu in the forage crops. 1956Nature 14 Jan. 95/1 In iron-deficient plants there is observed an increase of the soluble forms of nitrogen, with a simultaneous decrease of its protein forms.
1846Amer. Jrnl. Sci. & Arts II. 385 We find in the weight of the two *iron-falls (Croatia, 1752, and Tennessee, 1835) as set off against that of all the stones.., a ratio approximating that of one (for irons) to twenty (for stones). 1868Lockyer Elem. Astron. §315 Meteors commonly so called, bolides, stone-falls and ironfalls.
1669Dryden Tyrannic Love v. i. Wks. 1883 III. 454, I'll try if she be wholly *iron⁓free If not by sword, then she shall die by fire. 1896Albutt's Syst. Med. I. 196 All these pigments are iron-free.
1840Sydney Gaz. 8 Feb. in Stewart & Keesing Old Bush Songs (1957) 29 I'll tell the Mahers, MacNamaras and McCartys All about *iron gangs and road parties. 1848H. W. Haygarth Recoll. Bush Life Austral. iv. 35 Had escaped with one or two others from his ‘iron gang’. 1945Baker Austral. Lang. ii. 44 A bullock wagon taking supplies to men in an iron gang.
1894Electrician 14 Dec. 190/2 In the case of certain transformers specially tested for the purpose no time increase in the *iron loss takes place. 1931A. W. Hirst Direct Current Machine Design vi. 106 (heading) Armature iron losses. 1958E. H. Frost-Smith Theory & Design Magnetic Amplifiers xiii. 366 Excessive iron losses cause reduced gain.
1826W. E. Andrews Exam. Fox's Cal. Prot. Saints 262 Fox says, this Woodman was an *iron-maker. 1875Whitney Life Lang. ix. 155 The iron-maker..has occasion every day to say many things which would not be understood by a man of any of the other classes.
1890Daily News 17 Feb. 2/6 If the miners strike, *ironmaking will be stopped.
1559in Cecil Papers (H.M.C.) I. 164 Now there are *iron-mills English iron is sold at 9l. 1581Act 23 Eliz. c. 5 Preamble, The late Erection of sundry Iron-Mills in divers Places of this Realm. 1632Shirley Ball ii. ii, How do the fens? Goes the draining forward, and your iron mills?
1838Boston (Mass.) Weekly Mag. 24 Nov. 91/1 Having visited the *Iron Mountain in Missouri..I am happy to add my testimony..respecting the remarkable deposites of iron ores. 1846Sci. Amer. 12 Dec. 90/1 The new blast furnace at the iron mountain is again in blast. 1887Encycl. Brit. XXII. 638/2 [Sumatra]. Iron is not unfrequent, and magnetic iron is obtained at the ‘Iron Mountain’ near Fort van der Capellen. 1969Times 21 Nov. 27/3 The most poignant part of the trip was a visit to Hamersley [in Western Australia] to see Mount Tom Price, the ‘iron mountain’.
1851D. Wilson Preh. Ann. (1863) II. iii. iv. 116 During this era to which the name of *Iron-Period is applied. 1874Boutell Arms & Arm. i. 3 The third or ‘Iron Period’, when bronze generally was superseded by iron.
1892*Iron play [see putting vbl. n.2 1]. 1973Country Life 21 June 1806/3 An historic exhibition of iron play by a master of the game [sc. golf].
1909Westm. Gaz. 22 Feb. 12/2 He was also a most accomplished *iron player.
1876Voyle & Stevenson Mil. Dict. (ed. 3) 20/2 The ordinary *iron rations for two days should be 2 lbs. preserved meat and 2 lbs. biscuits, supplemented in such manner as circumstances admit. 1896Farmer & Henley Slang IV. 16/1 Iron-rations (nautical), tinned meat; specifically boiled salt-beef. 1915‘I. Hay’ First Hundred Thousand xvi. 215 A haversack, occupied by his ‘iron ration’— an emergency meal of the tinned variety, which must never on any account be opened except by order of the C.O. 1918E. S. Farrow Dict. Mil. Terms 318 Fritz is getting his iron rations. 1925Fraser & Gibbons Soldier & Sailor Words 128 ‘Iron rations’ was in the War also a colloquial expression in speaking of a hot shell-fire, e.g., ‘Jerry is letting them have it, lots of iron rations flying about!’ 1951L. MacNeice tr. Goethe's Faust i. 61 O believe me, who have been chewing These iron rations many a thousand year. 1970R. Lowell Notebk. 235 The new painting has to live on iron rations. 1973Daily Tel. 25 Apr. 36/6 When the boys left on their expedition they took with them only one day's supply of food, and intended to pick up more provisions during their journey. They..included in their packs ‘iron rations’ of chocolate, raisins and Kendal mint cake.
1909Westm. Gaz. 28 May 12/3 Maxwell..had made a splendid *iron shot.
1877Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 4 Leaving *iron-sponge in the ore, which would greatly complicate the subsequent treatment.
1880Spon's Encycl. Manuf. I. 700 (Coffee) A minute fungus named Depazea maculosa, which causes the so-called ‘*iron stain’, circular or elliptical blotches of an ochreish-yellow colour.
1882Rosa Mulholland 4 Little Mischiefs xiii. 158 Last of all came the hot iron, with a little *iron-stand to hold it.
1860Weale Dict. Terms, *Iron yellow, jaune de fer, or jaune de Mars, etc., is a bright iron ochre, prepared artificially, of the nature of sienna earth.
b. Esp. in names of chemical compounds and minerals; as iron carbide, iron chloride, iron iodide, iron salts, iron sulphate, etc. (where ferric and ferrous, q.v., or the forms carbide of iron, etc., are more usual); iron-clay, same as clay ironstone (see clay n. 9); iron-flint, a name for ferruginous quartz; iron-glance, specular iron-ore (see glance n.2); iron-monticellite [tr. G. eisenmonticellit (C. Doelter Handb. d. Mineralchem. (1914) II. i. 499)], a silicate of calcium and iron, CaFeSiO4, analogous to monticellite, found as a constituent of slag and more recently as a natural mineral (kirschsteinite); iron pan (see quot. and pan n., and cf. hard-pan); iron pyrites, native bisulphuret of iron (see pyrites). See also iron alum, ironstone, etc.
1890Sir F. A. Abel Pres. Addr. Brit. Assoc., The elimination, within the mass, of carbon as an *iron-carbide perfectly stable at low temperatures.
1877Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 397 To repair unavoidable losses in the *iron-chloride of the bath.
1811Pinkerton Petral. II. 49 The eisenkiesel, or *iron-flint of the Germans, is only found in veins. 1843Portlock Geol. 226 Silicate of Iron..occurs associated with Iron-flint at Tullybrick, Ballynascreen.
1805–17R. Jameson Char. Min. (ed. 3) 256 Dissimilar streak, as in specular iron-ore, or *iron-glance. 1883A. H. Church Precious Stones vii. 88 Black hæmatite is an oxide of iron occurring under several common names, as specular iron ore, iron glance, and micaceous iron ore.
1843Portlock Geol. 225 Micaceous Iron Ore..associated with *Iron Jasper, and slightly titaniferous.
1937Mineral. Mag. XXIV. 613 *Iron-monticellite. 1950Jrnl. Amer. Ceramic Soc. XXXIII. 164/2 Iron-monticellite (CaFeSiO4) is a compound that forms an unbroken series of solid solutions with fayalite (Fe2SiO4). 1957Mineral. Mag. XXXI. 698 (heading) Kirschsteinite, a natural analogue to synthetic iron monticellite, from the Belgian Congo.
1840Outl. Flemish Husbandry in Brit. Husbandry III. ii. ii. 12 Between the sand and the loam, an indurated crust of earth cemented by carbonate of iron, which is well known to all improvers of poor sands by the name of the *iron pan. 1847Nat. Cycl. II. 913 A loose sandy surface soil, beneath which is an impervious stratum, called the iron pan, formed by the deposition of iron particles from the sand. 1949Antiquity XXIII. 35 A thick layer of the same blue clay..was incorporated in the body of the cairn between two layers of stones: it had been trampled down and iron-pan had formed on it. 1961Listener 12 Oct. 559/1 The soil is a ‘podsol’, with its contrasting dark, humic, white-leached, and iron-pan layers.
1805–17R. Jameson Char. Min. (ed. 3) 110 The convexity is parallel with the sides, as in *iron-pyrites. 1853W. Gregory Inorg. Chem. (ed. 3) 216 Iron Pyrites,..a very abundant mineral, of a yellow colour and metallic lustre, crystallising in cubes or octahedrons.
1879St. George's Hosp. Rep. IX. 43 Zinc sulphate in progressive doses, with *iron sulphate.
▪ II. † iron, n.2 Obs.
Also 7 iran.
[app. a var. of eren, erne, eagle. The spelling may be due to confusion with ern, dial. form of prec.]
A variant of erne, eagle; explained in 17th c. dicts. as, A male eagle.
1623Cockeram iii, Hawks, An Eagle, the male is called an Iran. a1683Walton Angler i. (1886) 17 There is of short-winged hawks, The eagle and iron. 1688R. Holme Armoury ii. 236/1 An Iron is the Male of an Eagle.
▪ III. iron, a.|ˈaɪən|
Forms: see iron n.
[OE. ísern, ísen, íren, for *ísern-en, etc., corresp. to Goth. eisarn-eins, OHG. îsarn-în, îsern-in, MHG. îser-in, îser-en, îser-n, Ger. eiser-n, MDu. iser-ijn, -in, -en, Du. ijzer-en.
The OE. forms, though identical in the nom. with the n. (app. through loss of the adj. ending -en, after -n of the n.) were real adjs., so inflected and entering into concord with ns., as seen in sense 1. During the ME. period the inflexions disappeared, first in the northern dialect, and last in the south (where the pl. in -e survived to c 1400). The adj. was thenceforth indistinguishable from the attributive use of the n. (as in gold, silver, brass, for golden, silvern, brazen), which again is largely owing to resolution of OE. compounds such as íren-bend, íren-byrne, ísern-scur, etc.; but the feeling of its being an adj. often permits the use of iron in senses and constructions in which it is parallel to golden, brazen, rather than to gold, brass. But in most modern uses it is impossible to distinguish it from the n. used attrib., from which it is here separated on historical grounds. An actual derivative adj. is found in irnen.]
1. Of iron; consisting or formed of iron. (L. ferreus.)
Beowulf (Z.) 2829 Ac him irenna ecᵹa for-namon. c825Vesp. Psalter ii. 9 Ðu reces hie in ᵹerde iserre. Ibid. cxlix. 8 To ᵹebindenne..eðele heara in bendum irnum. c897K. ælfred Gregory's Past. xxi. 165 Sete iserne weall betuh ðe and ða burh. a900O.E. Martyrol. 142 Se casere hine het swingan mid irenum gyrdum. 971Blickl. Hom. 43 Þonne bið he ᵹeteald to þære fyrenan eá, and to þæm isenan hoce. a1000Cædmon's Dan. 520 Het eac ᵹebindan beam..ærenum clammum and isernum. c1000ælfric Hom. I. 424 Lecgað ða isenan clutas hate glowende to his sidan. c1175Lamb. Hom. 121 Mid irenen Neilen he wes on þere rode ifestned. 1297R. Glouc. (Rolls) 6890 Lat nime foure yrene ssares..al a fure. a1300Cursor M. 23240 Þaa dintes ar ful fers and fell, herder þan es here irinn mell. 1387Trevisa Higden (Rolls) VI. 427 Þe foure irene nayles þat Crist was i-nayled with to þe rode. c1400Mandeville (Roxb.) viii. 30 Enclosed with hie walles and yrne ȝates. 1483Cath. Angl. 198/1 Iren, ferrum, ferreus. 1532Inv. in J. Noake Worcester Mon. (1866) 157 A brasen morter, with a yerne pestell. 1549Act 3 & 4 Edw. VI, c. 2 §7 No Person shall..occupy any Yeron Cards or Pickards, in rowing of any set Cloth. 1611Bible Deut. xxvii. 5 Thou shalt not lift vp any yron toole vpon them. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. i. 220 First Ceres..arm'd with Iron Shares the crooked Plough. 1764Goldsm. Trav. 436 Luke's iron crown, and Damien's bed of steel. 1861M. Pattison Ess. (1889) I. 47 An iron helmet and harness.
2. Having the appearance of iron; of the colour of iron (or iron-rust).
1613Purchas Pilgrimage (1614) 229 Hard stone of yron colour. 1632J. Hayward tr. Biondi's Eromena 60 A Knight of a low stature, and iron hue. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. i. 630 The Sun..In Iron Clouds conceal'd the Publick Light. a1728Woodward (J.), Some of them are of an iron red, and very bright. 1871Palgrave Lyr. Poems 85 Earth all one tomb lies round me, Domed with an iron sky.
3. fig. Resembling, or figured as resembling, iron in some characteristic quality, esp. hardness.
a. Extremely hard or strong (physically).
1382Wyclif Isa. xlviii. 4, I kneȝ forsothe for thou art hard, and an irene senewe thin haterel, and thi frount brasene [1611 thy necke is an yron Sinew]. 1772Holwel in Phil. Trans. LXII. 128 Acorns, saved from a tree..of the iron or wainscot species. 1798Wellington in Owen Wellesley's Desp. 764 We have now that iron frontier. 1834Medwin Angler in Wales I. 195 The compact and iron nature of the ground.
b. Extremely hardy or robust; capable of great endurance.
1617T. Campion Elegy Pr. Henry Wks. (Bullen) 137 How fit to stand in troops of iron heads. 1627tr. Bacon's Life & Death (1651) 16 A Man of an Iron body and minde. 1816Byron Siege Cor. xxv, Though aged, he was so iron of limb, Few of our youth could cope with him. 1833Alison Hist. Europe i. §4 (1849–50) I. 51 The iron and disciplined bands of Cromwell. a1864J. D. Burns Mem. & Rem. (1879) 338 The iron frame wasted by inward trouble.
c. Firm, inflexible; stubborn, obstinate, unyielding. iron hand: in var. phrases with velvet glove indicative of firmness or inflexibility combined with apparent softness or gentleness; also, formerly in Australia, the closure (see quots. 1876, 1883).
1602–17Hieron Wks. I. 8 Begge we of God therefore, that He would bend our yron necke. 1703Rowe Fair Penit. v. i. 1790, I have held the Ballance with an Iron Hand. 1849Macaulay Hist. Eng. ix. II. 476 The iron stoicism of William never gave way. 1849Robertson Serm. Ser. i. iv. (1866) 76 No iron strength of mind. 1850T. Carlyle Latter-d. Pamph. ii. 8 Soft of speech and manner, yet with an inflexible rigour of command..‘iron hand in a velvet glove’, as Napoleon defined it. 1852Tennyson Ode Wellington viii, Their ever-loyal iron leader's fame. 1854J. S. C. Abbott Napoleon (1855) I. iii. 58 With the same exhaustless, iron, diligence. 1876Victorian Hansard 20 Jan. 2002 They [sc. the Government] have dealt with the Opposition with a velvet glove; but the iron hand is beneath, and they shall feel it. 1883G. W. Rusden Hist. Austral. III. 406 The clôture, or the ‘iron hand’, as McCulloch's resolution was called, was adopted in Victoria, for one session. 1899G. Matheson Stud. Portrait Christ xii. 168 There is no grasp so iron as the grasp with which an idea holds. 1925Wodehouse Carry on, Jeeves! i. 14 You have to keep these fellows in their place, don't you know. You have to work the good old iron-hand-in-the-velvet-glove wheeze. 1941S. Wood Murder of Novelist (1946) xvi. 123 She..runs the town..with an iron hand. And no nonsense about a velvet glove. 1942R. A. J. Walling Corpse with Eerie Eye vi. 177 The velvet glove and the iron hand are outmoded. 1963Times 2 Feb. 7/2 Mr. Winston Field, who has so far shown only the velvet glove since he was elected Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia in December, today revealed the iron hand expected of Rhodesian Front Government when he announced a Bill to introduce the death penalty by hanging for various offences, including the throwing of petrol bombs.
†d. Unimpressionable, ‘stony’. Obs.
1596Spenser F.Q. v. x. 28 Powring forth their bloud in brutishe wize, That any yron eyes to see it would agnize. 1607Hieron Wks. I. 439 The iron deadnesse of mens hearts. 1651Raleigh's Ghost 13 There is no country so barbarous, or of so iron and hard a disposition.
e. Harsh, cruel, merciless; stern, severe.
1591Spenser M. Hubberd 254 This yron world..Brings downe the stowtest hearts to lowest state. 1665Sir T. Herbert Trav. (1677) 136 Abumansor one would think was born to an Iron destiny. 1796Burke Let. Regic. Peace iv. Wks. IX. 20 The first Republick in the World..is under her iron yoke. 1871R. Ellis Catullus lxiv. 203 Words which on iron deeds did sue for deadly requital.
f. Of or pertaining to the iron age (q.v.); ‘of baser vein’, debased; wicked. (Sometimes mixed with prec. sense.)
a1592H. Smith Serm. (Tegg's ed.) I. 241 Look not for a golden life in an iron world. 1614Raleigh Hist. World i. (1634) 155 But they..account the times injurious and yron. 1697Dryden Virg. Past. ix. 16 In these hard Iron Times. 1805Scott Last Minstr. i. Introd. 21 The bigots of the iron time.
g. Of metallic tone, harsh, unmusical.
1871Swinburne Songs bef. Sunrise Prel. 105 Heard their songs' iron cadences.
h. In phr. iron sleep or iron slumber, tr. L. ferreus somnus (Virg. æn. x. 745). Chiefly poet.
1624Trag. Nero iii. ii. in Bullen O. Pl. (1882) I. 49 Well, he shall sleepe the Iron sleepe of death. 1685Dryden Thren. August. ii. 70 An iron slumber sat on his majestic eyes. 1697― Virg. Georg. iv. 717 An Iron Slumber shuts my swimming Eyes. 1835Lytton Rienzi vi. v, His face was still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep.
4. Combinations and special collocations.
a. Parasynthetic combinations (in lit. and fig. senses): as iron-banded, iron-barred, iron-bowelled, iron-coated, iron-faced, iron-fisted (close-fisted, niggardly), iron-grated, iron-hooped, iron-jawed, iron-knobbed, iron-mailed, iron-minded, iron-mooded, iron-nerved, iron-pated, iron-railed, iron-ribbed, iron-sceptred, iron-souled, iron-studded, iron-visaged, iron-willed, iron-winged, iron-witted (dull-witted, stupid: see 3 d), iron-worded adjs.
1812Scott Rokeby iv. xxv, Mortham's *iron-banded chests.
1600Rowlands Lett. Humours Blood vii. 84 To fill old *Iron barred chests, he rakes. 1604Middleton Father Hubburd's T. Wks. (Bullen) VIII. 104 An usurer's great iron-barred chest.
1647Trapp Comm. Matt. vi. 24 An *iron-bowelled wretch.
1876Preece & Sivewright Telegraphy 187 Upon no account should *iron-capped insulators be made use of upon such lines.
1590Spenser F.Q. i. vii. 2 Disarmed all of *yron-coted Plate. 1735Thomson Liberty iii. 263 The deep phalanx..Of iron-coated Macedon.
1677W. Hughes Man of Sin iii. iii. 102 An *Iron-fac'd and Leaden-hearted..Person.
1852*Iron-fisted [see iron-headed 2]. 1883J. T. Trowbridge in Harper's Mag. Jan. 213/1 An iron-fisted miser.
1876Ouida Winter City ii. 13 A giant murderer *iron-gloved to slay you.
1814Scott Wav. xxxviii, A huge *iron-grated door..formed the exterior defence of the gateway.
1887G. Meredith Ballads & P. 74 Iron-capped and *iron-heeled.
a1744Pope Wks. (1751) VII. 349 *Iron-hoop'd hogsheads of strong beer.
1883‘Mark Twain’ Life on Mississippi iii. 45 I'm the old original *iron-jawed, brass-mounted..corpse-maker from the wilds of Arkansaw! 1926E. Hemingway Torrents of Spring (1933) i. 26 A short, iron-jawed man.
1842Tennyson Locksley Hall 169 *Iron-jointed, supple-sinew'd, they shall dive, and they shall run.
1895B. M. Croker Village Tales 196 Shut it out by merely closing to the street an *iron-knobbed wooden door. 1949Blunden After Bombing 41 At the iron-knobbed church door.
1828Carlyle Miscel., Burns (1872) II. 12 Rose-coloured Novels and *iron-mailed Epics.
1897J. L. Allen Choir Invisible xii. 168 Fighting it all over in his foolish, *iron-minded way. 1944Blunden Shells by Stream 9 Squadrons of gem-eyed hobby-horses Whirr round his iron-minded forces. 1968Punch 28 Feb. 323/2 His blunt, iron-minded relatives in Yorkshire.
1877Tennyson Harold ii. ii, This *iron-mooded Duke.
a1744Pope Wks. (1751) VII. 345 Opening the *iron-nail'd door.
1828–40Tytler Hist. Scot. (1864) II. 63 The *iron-nerved and ferocious nobles.
1608Day Hum. out of Br. Ded. (1881) 3 The *Iron-pated Muse-mongers about the towne.
1883‘Mark Twain’ Life on Mississippi xliv. 442 Long, *iron-railed verandas running along the several stories. 1893F. Adams New Egypt 130 Dusty iron-railed gardens. 1964A. Wykes Gambling i. 10 He had set up an iron-railed podium.
a1667Cowley Misc., Chronicle v, Under that *iron-sceptred queen.
1903Trawl May 30 In the wall in front of him was an *iron-studded door.
1601Munday Downf. Earl Huntingdon iv. i. in Hazl. Dodsley VIII. 179 Opening (like hell) his *iron-toothed jaws.
1822Byron Werner iv. i. 44 Brave *iron-visaged fellows.
1804J. Grahame Sabbath (1808) 21 With studded doors, And *iron-visor'd windows.
1848J. R. Lowell in National Anti-Slavery Standard 9 Nov. 96/1 In that far isle, whence, *iron-willed, The new-world's sires their bark unmoored. 1951M. McLuhan Mech. Bride (1967) 67/1 Thurber's ‘Mother’ is a flint-eyed, iron-willed, Republican matriarch.
1600Fairfax Tasso i. lxxxi. 1 The Brazen Trump of *iron-winged Fame.
1593Shakes. Rich. III, iv. ii. 28, I will conuerse with *Iron-witted Fooles, And vnrespectiue Boyes.
1830Tennyson Sonn. to J. M. K., To embattail and to wall about thy cause With *iron-worded proof.
b. Combinations in which iron is in attributive relation to the second element: as iron-face, an impudent or obstinate person (cf. brazen-face).
1534Acc. in J. Noake Worcester Mon. (1866) 192 A new cartt with yernband whelys. 1697Cibber Woman's Wit v. Wks. 1760 I. 194 Hark you Iron-face! Art not thou a perjur'd Rogue? 1847Smeaton Builder's Man. 193 Brass iron-butt hinges. 1863Bates Nat. Amazon I. 59 The entrance..was by an iron-grille gateway.
c. Phrases with specialized sense: iron cap = iron hat 2; iron chink [Chink n.5] (see quot. 1942); Iron Cross [G. das eiserne kreuz], a German and Austrian decoration awarded for distinguished services in war (founded by Frederick William III of Prussia in 1813, to reward those who served in the wars against Napoleon, and later revived by William I in 1870); iron crown, the ancient crown of the kings of Lombardy, so called from having a circlet of iron inserted (reputed to have been made from one of the nails of the Cross); Iron Duke, a name for the first Duke of Wellington (1769–1852); Iron Guard, an anti-Semitic, Fascist, terrorist Romanian political party developed from the Legion of the Archangel Michael, found by C. Z. Codreanu (? 1899–1938) in 1927; iron gum(-tree) Austral., one of several Queensland species of Eucalyptus which have particularly strong wood; iron horse, a locomotive steam-engine; also, a bicycle or tricycle; iron jubilee, the seventieth anniversary of an event; iron law (of wages), the law or idea that wages tend to sink to the level of mere subsistence; iron maiden, an instrument of torture consisting of a coffin-shaped box lined inside with iron spikes, inside which the victim is confined; also transf. and fig.; also iron maid; iron mask, a mask, supposedly made of iron, worn by a political prisoner in France at the time of Louis XIV who died in the Bastille in 1703 and whose identity is disputed; hence used as the name of the prisoner himself; also fig.; iron mike slang, a familiar name for the automatic steering device of a ship; iron oak, any of several oaks with particularly durable wood, as Quercus cerris, Q. stellata, etc.; iron paper, extremely thin sheet-iron; iron virgin = iron maiden; iron walls, the iron-clad ships of the British navy, regarded as a defence to the country (cf. wooden walls); iron wedding (see wedding). See also iron age, iron hat.
1911Chambers's Jrnl. Mar. 166/1 The indication of a deposit of pyrites is the appearance of an outcrop of oxide of iron more or less honeycombed. This is called the ‘*iron cap’, or in Cornwall ‘gossan’.
1913Heaton's Guide to Western Canada 11 In the salmon canneries the introduction of a machine called the ‘*Iron Chink’, for cleaning and cutting the fish has made a great economy in the cost of labor. 1914Star 14 Nov. 4/4 The ‘iron chink’ cuts off the heads, tails, and fins, dresses the fish at the rate of 3,000 per hour. 1942H. W. von Loesecke Outl. Food Technol. vi. 228 The fish..go to the so-called ‘iron chink’, a machine which automatically severs the head and eviscerates the fish. In the early days of the [salmon] industry, this work was performed by Chinese labor, hence the name ‘iron chink’ for the machine. 1963Vancouver Sun 5 Apr. 34/1 (Advt.), Fishing company requires qualified iron chink operator.
1871Monthly Packet July 24 Two prints which appeared during the autumn of 1870 in the Illustrated London News, one..of the Crown Prince distributing the *Iron Cross. 1902Encycl. Brit. XXXI. 340/2 The Austrian Iron Cross, founded by Napoleon I. as king of Italy in 1805..conferred for personal merit. 1914Punch 11 Nov. 390/2 The Iron Cross. (For German looters.) 1944V. G. Garvin tr. R. Gary's Forest of Anger xxvi. 114 My Frieda would rather have me back with pox than dead with the Iron Cross!
1807Ann. Reg. 1805 XLVII. 135/2 The *iron crown of Charlemagne was destined to circle the brows of Bonaparte. Ibid. 137/1 A new order of knighthood was instituted, that of ‘the iron crown’. 1839Penny Cycl. XIV. 104/2 At Pavia..the successors of Charlemagne were crowned with the iron crown of Lombardy as kings of Italy. 1861J. G. Sheppard Fall Rome i. 12 Yet the German still guards, though no longer in a Lombard fortress, the iron Crown.
1850*Iron Duke [see duke n. 3 a]. 1852(title) The wisdom of Wellington; or maxims of the Iron Duke. 1882[see Corsican a. and n. 1]. 1928O. Brett Wellington xix. 278 (heading) The Iron Duke. 1957Encycl. Brit. XXIII. 501 As a diplomatist the ‘Iron Duke’..was no match for the ‘Iron Tsar’. 1965W. R. Benét Reader's Encycl. (ed. 2) 1081/1 Wellington, 1st duke of. Arthur Wellesley. Known as the Iron Duke.
1933Times 16 Nov. 13/2 It is reported that the new Government has decided to dissolve the *Iron Guard organization..anti-Semitic and pro-Fascist and Hitlerist. 1934Ann. Reg. 1933 210 M. Duca..was assassinated..by a student member of the Iron Guard. 1942L. B. Namier Conflicts 46 The Iron Guard, which was indebted to Germany for much of its income and of its revolutionary élan, indulged in the extremest forms of anti-Semitism, demanded a complete dictatorship with a social revolutionary programme. 1971W. Laqueur Dict. Politics 438 After mounting Iron Guard atrocities and massacres of Gentiles as well as Jews, Antonescu repressed the Iron Guards with German consent.
1879F. von Mueller Eucalyptographia 1, s.v. Eucalyptus Raveretiana. Vernacularly it passes in the districts of its growth as ‘Grey Gum-tree’ and ‘*Iron Gum-tree’. 1888F. M. Bailey Queensland Woods 63 E[ucalyptus] Raveretiana... Thozet's Box or Iron Gum-tree. A large tree with a scaly bark persistent on the trunk. 1919R. T. Baker Hardwoods Austral. 173 Eucalyptus Raveretiana, F. von M. ‘Thozet's Box’ or ‘Iron Gum Tree’{ddd}close-grained, very hard, and tough; valuable for building purposes. 1957N.Z. Timber Jrnl. Sept. 61/1 Irongum: Eucalyptus spp. Australia. The best known is E. maculata Hook, or spotted gum. Weight 64 lbs. 1970N. Hall et al. Forest Trees Austral. 46 Spotted iron gum (Qld) Eucalyptus maculata.
1840D. March Yankee Land 23 There were noble steeds in the days of old... But the *iron horse, there were none like him! 1846Congress. Globe 6 Feb. 323/3 The iron horse..with the wings of the wind,..vomiting fire and smoke. 1874Iron horse [see horse n. 6 a]. 1875Echo 29 Oct. (Farmer), Mr. S. started on his third day's journey of the 650 miles ride on his iron-horse. 1887T. A. Trollope What I remember I. vii. 156 Before the iron horse had been trained to cross the Atlantic. 1958C. Achebe Things fall Apart xvi. 129 Stories about these strange men [sc. missionaries] had grown since one of them had been killed in Abame and his iron horse tied to the sacred silk-cotton tree. 1967C. O. Skinner Madame Sarah viii. 171 The engineer returned to his iron horse and the train started.
1903Westm. Gaz. 6 Feb. 10/1 Pope Leo XIII. will celebrate..during the present year..his ‘*Iron Jubilee’ as a priest—he was ordained seventy years ago.
1896R. H. I. Palgrave Dict. Pol. Econ. II. 568/1 He [sc. Lassalle] dwelt on what he called the *iron or ‘brazen law’ (ehernes Gesetz) of wages, already laid down by Turgot and Ricardo. 1907J. S. Nicholson in Cambr. Mod. Hist. X. 774 Ricardo..was credited with the ‘iron law of wages’ on the one side and the theories of the continuous growth of rent and the unearned increment on the other. 1913Pitman's Commercial Encycl. IV. 1662/2 The ‘iron law’..of the mere subsistence wage taught that the general rate of wages constantly tends to starvation limit. 1966A. Gilpin Dict. Econ. Terms 219 Subsistence theory. Of French origin, this ‘iron law’ of wages asserted that if wages rose above subsistence level an increase in population would inevitably follow, thus forcing wages down again to subsistence level.
1951E. E. Cummings Let. 10 Feb. (1969) 211 Later or sooner I always glimpse a miserably exhausted me—tortured in his ‘*iron maid’—waiting & waiting.
1895Brewer's Dict. Phr. & Fable (new ed.) 662/2 *Iron Maiden of Nuremberg,..a box big enough to admit a man, with folding-doors, the whole studded with sharp iron spikes. When the doors were pressed-to these spikes were forced into the body of the victim... (German, Eiserne Jungfrau.) 1958J. Baldwin in W. King Black Short Story Anthol. (1972) 278 Then she hated herself; thinking into what an iron maiden of love and hatred he had placed her, she hated him even more. 1962F. I. Ordway et al. Basic Astronautics xii. 465 Submerged in this water-filled ‘iron maiden’..a subject was able to withstand 31 G for a period of 5 sec. 1972Daily Tel. 11 Oct. 19/7 The ‘callous and inhuman’ treatment of a Moscow Jewish scientist said to have been incarcerated in an ‘iron maiden’... He had been held..in a cell measuring 3 ft by 18 inches... The walls of the cell were covered with spikes which prevented him leaning or sitting down.
1752tr. Voltaire's Age of Lewis XIV, II. xxiv. 10 The marshal de Feuillade..has told me, that when his father-in-law [sc. Chamillard] was dying, he conjured him..to tell him who this person was, who had been known by no other name than that of the man with the *iron mask. Chamillard answered him, it was the secret of state, and he had sworn never to reveal it. 1826G. A. Ellis (title) The true history of the state prisoner commonly called the Iron Mask, extracted from documents in the French archives. 1841C. Fox Jrnl. 20 Apr. (1972) 104 Sterling..believes that Kasper Häuser was an imposter. The Iron Mask much more fascinating, but unluckily there was no prince in Europe missing at the time. 1858Geo. Eliot Let. 21 Jan. (1954) II. 424 The iron mask of my incognito seems quite painful in forbidding me to tell Dickens how thoroughly his generous impulse has been appreciated. 1869‘Mark Twain’ Innoc. Abr. (1870) xi. 75 They showed us the noisome cell where the celebrated ‘Iron Mask’—that ill-starred brother of a hard-hearted king of France—was confined. 1893H. L. Williams tr. Dumas's Man in Iron Mask xliii. 332 D'Artagnan..asked himself..why the Iron Mask had thrown the silver plate at the feet of Raoul? 1959Oxf. Compan. French Lit. 460/2 So persistent was the rumour that Monmouth had survived his supposed execution in 1685 that Voltaire thought it necessary to deny..that he was the Man in the Iron Mask. 1968M. Guybon tr. Solzhenitsyn's First Circle x. 52 At all times the privileged prisoner's cell was in semi-darkness... The other prisoners nicknamed him ‘The Man in the Iron Mask’. No one knew his real name.
1926M. Crane Yarns from Windjammer 27 He [sc. the quartermaster] will be jealous indeed of the praise bestowed on *Iron Mike, an eight-foot high iron box, with complicated electrical ‘innards’, for the Captain of the liner on which Gyro-pilot—Iron Mike's Sunday name—was tried, stated that the ship saved eight or ten miles a day by superior steering. 1937Jrnl. R. Aeronaut. Soc. XLI. 415 The automatic helmsman or ‘Iron Mike’ for marine craft was a proved success. 1956A. G. Course Merchant Navy Today ix. 130 Now we have a gyro-compass pilot or automatic helmsman—often known as an ‘iron mike’—which steers the ship.
1742W. Ellis Timber-Tree Improved II. i. 15 The white *iron or ring Oak has its Name from the long Duration of its Timber. 1810W. Wade tr. Michaux's Quercus 1 Chéne gris. Upland white oak, iron oak. 1832D. J. Browne Sylva Amer. 275 In Maryland and a great part of Virginia..it [sc. Quercus stellata] is called Box White Oak, and sometimes Iron Oak and Post Oak. 1838J. C. Loudon Arboretum III. 1846 Q[uercus] Cerris L. The bitter, or mossy-cupped, Oak{ddd}the Turkey Oak; the Iron, or Wainscot, Oak. 1908N. L. Britton N. Amer. Trees 342 It [sc. Quercus stellata, post oak] is also known as Box white oak, Iron oak [etc.].
1871F. Kilvert Diary 27 Dec. (1969) II. 101 A new invention, *iron paper, as thin as the thinnest tissue paper. The sheets of iron are rolled so thin that 3000 sheets together are only an inch thick.
c1895B. Stoker Squaw in B. Stoker Bedside Compan. (1973) 123 When we got back to the chamber we found Hutcheson still opposite the *Iron Virgin. 1906J. Huneker Melomaniacs 273 You remember the summer I spent at Nuremberg digging up the old legend, and the numberless times I visited the torture chamber where stands the real Iron Virgin, her interior studded with horrid spikes? 1973C. Osborne in B. Stoker B. Stoker Bedside Compan. 11 ‘The Squaw’..involves a torture device which Bram had examined in Nuremburg, a contraption known as the ‘Iron Virgin’.
1897Westm. Gaz. 26 June 1/3 Fortified by the sense of our *iron-walls.
Add:[3.] [e.] Freq. iron heel: in phrases denoting ruthless or unrelenting (esp. political) oppression.
1838W. H. Prescott Hist. Reign Ferdinand & Isabella II. xi. 47 The green crop had no time to ripen ere it was trodden down under the iron heel of war. 1893[see tsar n. b]. 1907J. London (title) The iron heel. 1954W. Faulkner Fable 248 She [sc. Paris] was inviolate and immune to the very iron heel beneath which the rest of France..lay supine and abased. 1984N.Y. Times 10 Feb. a3/1 He sees rate-capping as ‘the iron heel of Whitehall that is threatening to crush democratic local government in Britain’.
[4.] [c.] Iron Lady, a nickname applied to Margaret (subsequently Baroness) Thatcher (b. 1925), British Conservative politician and prime minister (1979–1990), on account of her allegedly ruthless and inflexible stance esp. on foreign policy.
1976Sunday Times 25 Jan. 3/2 The Soviet defence ministry newspaper Red Star yesterday called Opposition leader Margaret Thatcher, ‘The *iron lady’ and accused her of trying to revive the cold war. 1976M. Thatcher in Sunday Times 1 Feb. 1/2, I stand before you tonight in my red chiffon evening gown, my face softly made up, my fair hair gently waved... The Iron Lady of the Western World! Me? 1977Economist 23 July 81/2 He then threatened the unions with the spectre of the iron lady. 1989Life Autumn 74 Entering her second decade at 10 Downing Street, the Iron Lady has served more consecutive years in office than any British PM since 1827.
▪ IV. iron, v.|ˈaɪən|
[f. iron n.1]
1. trans. To fit, furnish, cover, or arm with iron. (Chiefly in pa. pple.: see ironed a. 2.)
c1430Pilgr. Lyf Manhode i. cvii. (1869) 57 It misliked me of my burdoun that it was not yrened. c1489Caxton Sonnes of Aymon xxii. 491 A palster well yrened for to bere in his hande. 1517J. Fitzherb. in Eng. Hist. Rev. XII. 235, ij horse harrowes yroned. 1649W. Blithe Eng. Improv. Impr. (1653) 197 Let him not neglect a day, but iron his plough with slips or clouts in all the wearing places. 1793Trans. Soc. Arts XI. 195 Made of ash..and ironed as the model. 1797Coleridge Christabel i. 126 The gate that was ironed within and without. 1847Emerson Poems (1857) 26 What if Trade..thatch with towns the prairie broad With railways ironed o'er.
2. To shackle with irons; to put in irons.
1653Middleton & Rowley Sp. Gypsy iv. iii. H ij b, Iron him then, let the rest goe free. 1794Burke Sp. agst. W. Hastings Wks. XV. 457 The miserable victimes were imprisoned, ironed, scourged. 1831Tytler Lives Sc. Worthies I. 276 Wallace was cast into a dungeon and heavily ironed. 1856Froude Hist. Eng. II. 473 Mark Smeton, who had confessed his guilt, was ironed.
3. a. To smooth or press with a heated flat-iron, as cloth, and the like. Also absol. and fig. esp. with out.
a1680Earl of Rochester Trial of the Poets (R.), Little starch'd Johnny Crown at his elbow he found, His cravat⁓string new iron'd. 1708Motteux Rabelais iv. lii. (1737) 214 Their..Neck-Ruffs, new wash'd, starch'd, and iron'd. 1737Fielding Tumble Down Dick 1068/2 Draw the scene, and discover..her maid ironing her linen. 1789Loiterer No. 44. 9 The servants are all ironing. 1840Dickens Old C. Shop x, Mrs. Nubbles ironed away in silence for a minute or two. 1870Ramsay Remin. ii. (ed. 18) 23 She..found the occupant busy..ironing out some linens. 1879Mrs. Oliphant Within Precincts v, Her white muslin frock..she ironed herself most carefully.
fig.1863W. Phillips Speeches xiv. 312 He irons his face out to portentous length and sadness. 1892Ouida in Fortn. Rev. LII. 797 The whole tendency of Socialism..is to iron down humanity into one dreary level. 1905Springfield (Mass.) Weekly Republ. 31 Mar. 8 The differences between Chairman Flaherty..and Col. William A. Gaston are in a fair way to be amicably ironed out. 1924‘L. Malet’ Dogs of Want v. 122 Mr. Harvey-Noakes plays a ripping game... He has flattened me out,..completely ironed me out. 1929Observer 17 Nov. 3/4 The best practical method of ironing out ups and downs of the business cycle. 1930Time & Tide 28 Mar. 389 The progress of negotiations to ‘iron out’ differences between Britain, Japan, and America. 1949F. Swinnerton Doctor's Wife comes to Stay vii. 80 Roly..had married a widow with children,..and been—in the cliché of the day—‘ironed out’. 1971Daily Tel. 28 Oct. 29/5 Like the great horseman he is, he patiently ironed out the kinks in plenty of time to catch Hush Money on the flat. 1971Guardian 1 Nov. 6/4 The new computer was delivered..last week... Ironing out the bugs will probably take until the new year.
b. intr. Of a garment, material, etc.: to respond to ironing, to undergo smoothing or pressing with an iron.
1943Mod. Lang. Notes Jan. 12 They claim that..‘lingerie tubs quickly and irons easily’. 1946Ibid. Nov. 444 The use, in advertising, of the ‘potential intransitive’, in such examples as..‘this dress washes and irons and packs easily’.
¶4. By ignorant or humorous perversion from irony n., sometimes with allusion to sense 3:
a. intr. To use irony, speak ironically;
b. trans. To treat with irony, speak ironically to.
1742Fielding J. Andrews i. vi, Mrs. Slipslop. You must treat me with ironing? Barbarous monster! 1813Sporting Mag. XLI. 261 Others, who are blest with Mrs. Slipslop's second-hand knowledge and comprehension of words and rhetoric, will say, that I am ironing. 1823Bee Dict. Turf s.v. Ironing (Farmer), Nay, my Coney, now you're ironing me..all down the back. 1840Marryat Olla Podr. (Rtldg.) 326 The fellow's ironing me. |