Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A final, painful, or disastrous extremity.
- n. Nautical The inboard end of a chain, rope, or cable, especially the end of a rope or cable that is wound around a bitt.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Nautical, that part of a cable which is abaft the bitts, and therefore within board, when the ship rides at anchor.
Wiktionary
- n. nautical that part of an anchor cable which is abaft the bitts and thus remains inboard when a ship is riding at anchor
- n. idiomatic The end of a long and difficult process.
- n. nautical the final six fathoms of anchor chain before the point of attachment in the chain locker of modern U.S.naval vessels, with these six fathoms often painted blue, white and red to warn deck hands of the end of available anchor chain.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. that part of a cable which is abaft the bitts, and so within board, when the ship rides at anchor.
WordNet 3.0
- n. (nautical) the inboard end of a line or cable especially the end that is wound around a bitt
- n. the final extremity (however unpleasant it may be)
Etymologies
- English bitter, bitt (bitt + -er1) + end. Sense 1, influenced by bitter. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“For three or four years they had fought our troops obstinately, and surrendered at the bitter end in the belief that they were merely overpowered, not conquered.”
Fictionaut: She Makes Her Mouth Small & Round & Other Stories
“The vine of Sodom always thought might refer to Cucumis calocynthis, which is bitter end powders inside; the term vine would scarcely be given to any but a trailing or other plant of the habit of a vine. ”
“Falk on the indignities we suffer in our death-denying culture, “where patients, regardless of mental status or the irreversibility of disease, are treated until the bitter end when they lie bloated, bleeding, and crushed after the final flurry of infusions and cardiac massage.””
“Sometimes I thought I was sure ’nough from Ohier, an’ other times I could ’a swore I was from th’ bitter end of Florida.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘bitter end’.
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alpha omega αώ terms
two words that say it all and contrast/complement one another
startling end, az wy, az wye, round trip, circle around, tune gap, begin end, collect lection, lectio lectitandos, dash all, together alone, go-slow stopwatch and 64 more...
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Knots!
O time, thou must untangle this, not I.
It is too hard a knot for me to untie.
-- Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act 2, scene 2figure eight, cat's paw, fisherman's knot, miller's knot, tiller's hitch, chain hitch, surgeon's knot, bowline on bight, sailor's knot, stevedore's knot, timber hitch, clove hitch and 148 more...
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A Long, Strange Trip
You'll definitely need a map. Inspired by Son of Groucho's comment on Islets of Langerhans.
slough of despond, pit of despair, den of iniquity, islets of langerhans, hippocampus, boulevard of brok..., canals of hering, hesselbach's tria..., crypts of lieberkühn, angle of louis, circle of willis, traube's space and 102 more...
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Whaleworthy & Piratical Words
A list of favorite nautical words to be sprinkled liberally throughout speech for piratical or Melvillian effect.
batten down, back and fill, beamy, baulking, beckets, bilge, bold shore, boomjumper, breaker, larboard, abaft, ash breeze and 156 more...
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Three Sheets to the Wind
Common words or phrases of nautical origin that have taken on different or metaphorical meanings. Chained_bear and I tossed a coin over who would make the list. I won (or lost, depending on how you...
scuttlebutt, taken aback, brass monkey, boot camp, clean bill of health, three sheets to t..., the devil to pay, between the devil..., by and large, the whole nine yards, mind your ps and qs, slush fund and 116 more...
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Stuffie: Get to the Point
Things you go or get to--with "the" (not to be confused with jennarenn's "get" stuffie. :-)
bone, contrary, fore, point, nines, full, gills, highest degree, nth degree, truth, hilt, minute and 23 more...
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Poetrie: Twat
Like a night club in the morning, you're the bitter end.
Like a recently disinfected shit-house, you're clean round the bend.
You give me the horrors
too bad to be true.
A...night club, bitter end, shit-house, the horrors, lousy, shat, pain, splattered, stain, raver, drag, polythene and 28 more...
Tweets
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chained_bear See usage note on bitts. Mar 5, 2008
reesetee A nautical term--specifically a knot-tying nautical term--referring to the loose end of a rope (as opposed to the standing end, which takes the strain). The name arises from securing hawsers on large ships. After a rope was winched tight, the strain on the hawser was temporarily taken up with a second rope attached to the hawser with a rolling hitch. The hawser was then taken off the winch, and the end, now loose, was transferred to the bitts--the strong posts to which the rope was secured. The term "bitter end" derived from this practice. Jan 8, 2008