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  1. curtail love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. v. To cut short or reduce. See Synonyms at shorten.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A corruption of curtal. Compare curtail, v.
  2. To cut short; cut off the end or a part of; dock; diminish in extent or quantity: as, to curtail words.
  3. To deprive by excision or removal; abate by deprivation or negation: as, to curtail one of part of his allowance, or of his proper title.
  4. n. In architecture, a member shaped like a volute or scroll, especially in stair-building, as in the lower termination of a hand-rail or the projection of the lowest step of a flight. See curtail-step.

Wiktionary

  1. v. obsolete To cut short the tail of an animal
  2. v. To shorten or abridge the duration of something; to truncate.
  3. v. figuratively To limit or restrict, keep in check.
  4. n. architecture A scroll termination, as of a step, etc.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. v. To cut off the end or tail, or any part, of; to shorten; to abridge; to diminish; to reduce.
  2. n. The scroll termination of any architectural member, as of a step, etc.

WordNet 3.0

  1. v. terminate or abbreviate before its intended or proper end or its full extent
  2. v. place restrictions on

Etymologies

  1. Alteration of curtal, from Old French courtault ("which has been shortened"), itself from court ("short") (from Latin curtus) + -ault (Wiktionary)
  2. Middle English curtailen, to restrict, probably blend of Old French courtauld, docked; see curtal, and Middle English taillen, to cut (from Old French tailler; see tailor). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

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  • kingparton I want to do only what I have it in my heart to do, and let others do the same; I do not ask anything of anybody; I do not want to curtail anybody's freedom. I want to be free myself.

    Nikolai Chernyshevsky, "What Is to Be Done?" Jul 27, 2011

  • mollusque CUrTail Apr 26, 2008

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‘curtail’ has been looked up 3136 times, loved by 5 people, added to 57 lists, commented on 2 times, and has a Scrabble score of 9.