Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A shaw or wood in which herons breed; a heronry.
- noun A heron; a heronsew.
- noun In heraldry, the representation of a heron, crane, or stork (all appearing alike).
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun obsolete Heronshaw.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Obsolete form of
heronshaw .
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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See here, old chap! you'll be older before you are younger, and some day you will know a hawk from a handsaw, _or_ hernshaw, according to which reading of
The Merryweathers Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards 1896
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'This is the very place where Winnie wonst tried to save a hernshaw as wur wounded.
Aylwin Theodore Watts-Dunton 1873
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The wing of the hawk that shall fetch the hernshaw, 455
Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning Robert Browning 1850
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_To know a hawk from a hernshaw_ is an ancient proverb, sometimes corrupted into _handsaw_.
Hamlet William Shakespeare 1590
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‘In actual application a _heronshaw_, _hernshaw_ or _hernsew_, is simply a
Early English Meals and Manners Frederick James Furnivall 1867
yarb commented on the word hernshaw
Teach your parrot to speak better Spanish, my friend, interrupted I; do you think we do not know a hawk from a hernshaw? Imagine not that the simple denial of the fact will settle the business.
- Lesage, The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, tr. Smollett, bk 7 ch. 1
September 20, 2008
yarb commented on the word hernshaw
See heronshaw.
September 20, 2008