tusk

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. An elongated pointed tooth, usually one of a pair, extending outside of the mouth in certain animals such as the walrus, elephant, or wild boar. Also called regionally tush².
2. n. A long projecting tooth or toothlike part.
3. v. To gore or dig with the tusks or a tusk.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A long pointed tooth; especially, a tooth long enough to protrude from the lips when the mouth is closed. Tusks are extremely prominent in some animals, as elephants, mastodons, and other proboscideans; the narwhal among cetaceans; various pachyderms, as the hippopotamus, boar, and babirussa; the walrus among pinniped carnivores; and the fossil saber-toothed tigers among ordinary carnivores. Tusks may be upper or lower; they are usually upper, but in the dinotherium lower. They are either incisors or canines in different animals, but are usually canines. They are always paired, except in the narwhal. The single developed upper incisor of the male narwhal is the longest tusk known, reaching a length of 10 or 12 feet, and it is spirally grooved as if twisted. Elephants' tusks are upper incisors, and furnish most of the ivory of commerce. The tusks of the walrus are upper canines; those of the boar tribe are canines, both upper and lower. The tusks of the dinotherium are a pair of lower incisors turned down out of the mouth. The socalled tusks or tushes of the horse are ordinary canines. See cuts under babirussa, boar, Dinotherium, elephant, Mastodontinæ, monodon, narwhal, Phacochærus, saber-toothed, and walrus.
2. n. A sharp projecting point resembling in some degree a tusk or tooth of an animal. Specifically— A tooth of a harrow.
3. n. In locks, a sharp projecting point or claw which forms a means of attachment or engagement.
4. n. In carpentry, a bevel shoulder on a tenon to give it additional strength.
5. n. A tooth-shell. See Dentaliidæ, and cut under tooth-shell.
6. To gore with the tusks.
7. To move, turn, or thrust with the tusks.
8. To gnash the teeth, as a boar; show the tusks.
9. n. A fish: same as torsk.
10. n. A tuft; a bush.

Wiktionary

1. n. One of a pair of elongated pointed teeth that extend outside the mouth of an animal such as walrus, elephant or wild boar.
2. n. A small projection on a (tusk) tenon.
3. v. To dig up using a tusk, as boars do.
4. v. obsolete To bare or gnash the teeth.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Zoöl.) Same as torsk.
2. n. (Zoöl.) One of the elongated incisor or canine teeth of the wild boar, elephant, etc.; hence, any long, protruding tooth.
3. n. (Zoöl.) A toothshell, or Dentalium; -- called also tusk-shell.
4. n. (Carp.) A projecting member like a tenon, and serving the same or a similar purpose, but composed of several steps, or offsets. Thus, in the illustration, a is the tusk, and each of the several parts, or offsets, is called a tooth.
5. v. obsolete To bare or gnash the teeth.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a hard smooth ivory colored dentine that makes up most of the tusks of elephants and walruses
2. n. a long pointed tooth specialized for fighting or digging; especially in an elephant or walrus or hog
3. v. remove the tusks of animals
4. v. stab or pierce with a horn or tusk