clutch

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

• transitive v. To grasp and hold tightly.
• transitive v. To seize; snatch.
• intransitive v. To attempt to grasp or seize: clutch at a life raft.
• intransitive v. To engage or disengage a motor vehicle's clutch.
• n. A hand, claw, talon, or paw in the act of grasping.
• n. A tight grasp.
• n. Control or power. Often used in the plural: caught in the clutches of sin.
• n. A device for gripping and holding.
• n. Any of various devices for engaging and disengaging two working parts of a shaft or of a shaft and a driving mechanism.
• n. The apparatus, such as a lever or pedal, that activates one of these devices.
• n. A tense, critical situation: came through in the clutch.
• n. A clutch bag.
• adj. Informal Being or occurring in a tense or critical situation: won the championship by sinking a clutch putt.
• adj. Informal Tending to be successful in tense or critical situations: The coach relied on her clutch pitcher.
• n. The complete set of eggs produced or incubated at one time.
• n. A brood of chickens.
• n. A group; a bunch.
• transitive v. To hatch (chicks).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

• n. The pedal in a car that disengages power transmission.
• n. A small handbag or purse with no straps or handle.
• n. An important or critical situation.
• adj. Performing or tending to perform well in difficult, high-pressure situations.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

• n. A gripe or clinching with, or as with, the fingers or claws; seizure; grasp.
• n. The hands, claws, or talons, in the act of grasping firmly; -- often figuratively, for power, rapacity, or cruelty.
• n. A device which is used for coupling shafting, etc., so as to transmit motion, and which may be disengaged at pleasure.
• n. Any device for gripping an object, as at the end of a chain or tackle.
• n. The nest complement of eggs of a bird.
• transitive v. To seize, clasp, or grip with the hand, hands, or claws; -- often figuratively.
• transitive v. To close tightly; to clinch.
• intransitive v. To reach (at something) as if to grasp; to catch or snatch; -- often followed by at.
• intransitive v. to become too tense or frightened to perform properly; used sometimes with up.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

• To grasp tightly or firmly; seize, clasp, or grip strongly: as, to clutch a dagger.
• To close tightly; clench.
• To fasten.
• To get; gain.
• Specifically To seize (a clutch of eggs); take from the clutch.
• To snatch, or endeavor to snatch; try to grasp or seize: with at.
• n. A grasp or hold; specifically, a strong grip upon anything.
• n. In machinery: A movable coupling or locking and unlocking contrivance, used for transmitting motion, or for disconnecting moving parts of machinery. See bayonet-clutch, friction-clutch, etc.
• n. The cross-head of a piston-rod.
• n. The paw, talon, or claw of a rapacious animal.
• n. Figuratively, the hand, as representing power; hence, power of disposal or control; mastery: chiefly in the plural: as, to fall into the clutches of an enemy.
• n. A hatch of eggs; the number of eggs incubated at any one time; in the case of the domestic hen, specifically, thirteen eggs.
• A dialectal variant of cluck.
• n.
• n. Nautical: A forked stanchion.
• n. The throat of a patent anchor.
• n. Oyster spawn.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• v. hold firmly, usually with one's hands
• v. affect
• n. a number of birds hatched at the same time
• n. a woman's strapless purse that is carried in the hand
• n. the act of grasping
• n. a collection of things or persons to be handled together
• v. take hold of; grab
• n. a pedal or lever that engages or disengages a rotating shaft and a driving mechanism
• n. a tense critical situation
• n. a coupling that connects or disconnects driving and driven parts of a driving mechanism