| 释义 |
trapeze|trəˈpiːz|
[a. F. trapèze in same senses, ad. L. trapezium.]
1. a. An apparatus for gymnastic exercises and feats, consisting of a horizontal cross-bar suspended by two ropes in the manner of a swing.
Prob. orig. applied to a kind in which the ropes formed a trapezium (in sense 1 b) with the roof and cross-bar.
1861Sat. Rev. 22 June 635 The ring is neither more nor less likely to cause death than the rope or the trapèze. 1865Public Opinion 21 Jan. 81 His performances are of a very extraordinary character; among other things, he holds on to the trapeze by his teeth. 1877Black Green Past. xxxvi, Will you..show the boys how to twist round a trapeze. 1880Encycl. Brit. XI. 350/2 The trapeze consists of a horizontal bar suspended by ropes at a height of 4 or 5 feet from the floor. 1908Daily Chron. 11 June 1/4 At this altitude of two miles above the ground her feet became entangled in the trapeze ropes.
b. Sailing. (See quot. 1961.)
1961F. H. Burgess Dict. Sailing 211 Trapeze, in sailing dinghies, a sliding support used by the crew for outboard balancing when they lay up to windward. 1969Daily Tel. 25 Oct. 7/7 The work covers the origins of the trapeze (a means of crew support to help in holding a light dinghy level in a breeze). 1977Modern Boating (Austral.) Jan. 43/3 Try looking at the race with your head upside down sometime when you are..flat out on the trapeze.
2. a. = trapezium. rare—0.
1864in Webster: hence in later Dicts.
b. (See quot. 1968); = trapeze-line, sense 3 below.
1958Spectator 13 June 761/2 Miss Lee is the only lady member to have adopted the new short skirt..and none of them has so far ventured upon the trapeze. 1968J. Ironside Fashion Alphabet 30 The trapeze was a wide, stiff full-skirted tent shape stopping at the knees and moulding the figure to a high bust in front while falling free from the shoulders at the back. Trapeze was short for trapezium..but somehow a circus trapeze seemed to describe it more visually and the fashion magazines showed dresses on, under or in front of them.
3. Comb., as trapeze artist, one who performs acrobatics on a trapeze; trapeze harness Sailing (see quot. 1981); trapeze-line [line n.2 14 b], a fashion style in which the outline of the garment resembles that of a trapezium (cf. sense 2 b above).
1938Amer. Mag. CXXV. 90 Mother Millette started as a trapeze artist. 1981W. Strathern Don't look for Me—I'm Dead iii. 52 The lean and sinewy strength of a trapeze artist.
1946Yachts & Yachting 20 Aug. 383/2 (Advt.), All G.R.P., well equipped boat Needlespar, trolley, cover, certificate, lifting rudder, trapeze harness, ready to race. 1981B. Webb Schult's Sailing Dict. 297/2 Trapeze, gear fitted to fast racing dinghies and some keelboats to enable the crew to put all his weight outboard to windward. The crew wears a trapeze harness or belt with a hook, which he slips into a ring on the lower end of the trapeze wire.
1958Vogue Mar. 119 His [sc. Yves St Laurent's] wedge-shaped silhouette—called..the Trapeze Line—is flared from narrow shoulders to a smooth wide hemline. 1975‘M. Fonteyn’ Autobiogr. ii. iv. 173 A ‘sack’ dress,..a development of Christian Dior's ‘Trapeze’ line which had been..worn by so many wrong-shaped ladies.
Hence traˈpezing, performance on the trapeze.
1894G. du Maurier Trilby I. 70 Fencing and boxing and trapezing seemed to be more in her line. 1905Daily Chron. 6 June 3/1 People who are revivified by trapezings and comic songs have no individuality to be recreated. |