Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To reach or extend over or beyond.
  • intransitive verb To miss by reaching too far or attempting too much.
  • intransitive verb To defeat (oneself) by going too far or by doing or trying to gain too much.
  • intransitive verb To get the better of, especially by deceitful cleverness; outwit.
  • intransitive verb To reach or go too far.
  • intransitive verb To overreach oneself.
  • intransitive verb To outwit or cheat others.
  • intransitive verb To strike the front part of a hind foot against the rear or side part of a forefoot or foreleg on the same side of the body. Used of a horse.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To overtake.
  • To reach beyond in any direction; rise above; extend or go beyond.
  • To deceive by cunning, artifice, or sagacity; cheat; outwit.
  • To reach or stretch too far.
  • Synonyms To dupe, circumvent, cozen, gull, bamboozle, take in.
  • In the manège, to strike the toe of the hind foot against the heel or shoe of the fore foot: said of a horse.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To reach above or beyond in any direction.
  • transitive verb To deceive, or get the better of, by artifice or cunning; to outwit; to cheat.
  • transitive verb To defeat one's own purpose by trying to do too much or by trying too hard or with excessive eagerness; -- used reflexively; /
  • intransitive verb To reach too far.
  • intransitive verb To strike the toe of the hind foot against the heel or shoe of the forefoot; -- said of horses.
  • intransitive verb (Naut.) To sail on one tack farther than is necessary.
  • intransitive verb To cheat by cunning or deception.
  • noun The act of striking the heel of the fore foot with the toe of the hind foot; -- said of horses.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The act of striking the heel of the fore foot with the toe of the hind foot; -- said of horses.
  • noun The act of extending or reaching too far, overextension.
  • verb To reach above or beyond in any direction.
  • verb To deceive, or get the better of, by artifice or cunning; to outwit; to cheat.
  • verb To reach too far
  • verb To strike the toe of the hind foot against the heel or shoe of the forefoot; -- said of horses.
  • verb To sail on one tack farther than is necessary.
  • verb To cheat by cunning or deception.

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

  • verb beat through cleverness and wit
  • verb fail by aiming too high or trying too hard

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

over- +‎ reach.

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