Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A ribbon or silk braid for fastening the two sides of a shoe together, usually more ornamental than a shoe-string, and formerly very elaborate: hence used, humorously, as a name for a traveler.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The thought involuntarily pressed on her that she herself must venture, were it but the point of her fairy foot, beyond the prescribed boundary, if she ever hoped to give a lover so reserved and bashful an opportunity of so slight a favour as but to salute her shoe-tie.

    The Talisman 2008

  • We who are looking on of course know that she loved him; that from this moment there was nothing belonging to him, down to his shoe-tie, that would not be dear to her heart and an emblem so tender as to force a tear from her.

    He Knew He Was Right 2004

  • The body of the great King has been measured more justly than it was measured by the courtiers who were afraid to look above his shoe-tie.

    The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 20, No. 561, August 11, 1832 Various

  • "I am yours, my lord, to the shoe-tie," answered the Doctor, bowing still lower than the Earl had done.

    The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) Various

  • This at once put an end to the dilemma, for he had on previous occasions noticed the peculiarity of her shoe-tie, and he boldly took hold of her hand.

    Welsh Folk-Lore a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales Elias Owen

  • Helen has hands that I kiss "-- and he kissed them --" the most beautiful hands in the world; and she has feet whose very shoe-tie I adore; but, nevertheless, there is nothing aggressive about her insteps and ankles.

    Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 Various

  • I haven't seen so much as the tip of his shoe-tie to-day.

    The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 08, No. 47, September, 1861 Various

  • The thought involuntarily pressed on her that she herself must venture, were it but the point of her fairy foot, beyond the prescribed boundary, if she ever hoped to give a lover so reserved and bashful, an opportunity of so slight a favour, as but to salute her shoe-tie.

    The Talisman 1894

  • Getting dressed was, however, a grand flurry of excitement, for time and space were limited; and there was not one of the Happy Hexagons who did not feel that on this occasion, at least, every curl and ribbon and shoe-tie must display a neatness that was military in its precision.

    The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch 1894

  • One of them, however, thrust her foot a little forward; and the hero recognized a peculiarity of her shoe-tie, which he had somehow had leisure to notice at his previous interviews.

    The Science of Fairy Tales An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology Edwin Sidney Hartland 1887

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