bearhound
Appearance
English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Noun
[edit]bearhound (plural bearhounds)
- A dog used for bearbaiting or bear hunting.
- 1887, Thomas Wallace Knox, The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire, Chapter 11:
- "For his amusement John the Terrible used to order a number of people to be sewed up in bear-skins, and then torn to death by bear-hounds. For tearing prisoners to pieces he ordered the tops of several trees to be bent down so that they came together; the limbs of the unfortunate victim were fastened to these tops, each limb to a different tree. When they were thus tied up, the release of the trees performed the work intended by the cruel Czar."
- 1918, Melville Davisson Post, Uncle Abner: Master of Mysteries, Chapter 5text=There seemed no overt reason, old Clayborne said, but presently Dabney began to act like a man in fear. He made friends with the dog, a big old bearhound. He got a fowling piece and set it up by the head of his bed, and finally took the dog into the room with him at night. He kept out of the house by day.:
References
[edit]- “bearhound”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.