| 释义 |
saddle-backed, a.|ˈsæd(ə)lbækt|
1. a. Having the back, upper surface, or edge curved like a saddle; having a concavely curved outline; spec. in Archery (see quot. 1545).
1545R. Ascham Toxoph. ii. (Arb.) 129 Fourthly in couling or sheryng [the feather of a shaft],..whether somewhat swyne backed (I must vse shoters wordes) or sadle backed, whether rounde, or square shorne? 1599Hakluyt Voy. II. ii. 126 It is a hill sadlebacked..: and..we saw a row of hils sadlebacked also. 1601Holland Pliny I. 238 They [dolphins] are saddle-backed. Ibid. 492 The Walnut tree wood soone bendeth, and is saddle-backt as it lieth. 1884G. Allen Philistia I. 235 A saddle-backed hill. 1910A. Bennett Clayhanger ii. xxi. 313 He would begin to establish himself in a saddle-backed, ear-flapped easy-chair.
b. Placed astride like a saddle.
1878J. H. Beadle Western Wilds xxx. 487 Colorado is divided nearly down the center by the main chain of the Rocky Mountains—or, in miner's phrase, ‘saddle-backed across the range’.
2. Of a horse: see quot. 1831.
1675Lond. Gaz. No. 967/4 Strayed or stolen.., a bright Bay Gelding,..a little Saddle-back'd. 1753Chambers Cycl. Supp. 1831Youatt Horse 166 Some horses have a very considerable hollow behind the withers. They are said to be saddle-backed. 1895Westm. Gaz. 29 July 2/3 A thorough⁓bred Arab..should be..very slightly saddle-backed. To be ‘saddle-backed’ is to have a depression where the saddle would naturally come.
3. Arch.
a. Of coping: see quot. 1842.
b. Of a tower: Having a saddleback.
1842Gwilt Archit. s.v. Coping, Coping thicker in the middle than at the edges is called saddle-backed coping. 1870F. R. Wilson Ch. Lindisf. 23 A small straight saddle⁓backed tower.
4. An epithet applied to birds and animals having saddle-like markings on the back, as saddle-backed crow, the Grey Crow, Corvus cornix; saddle-backed shrew = saddle-back n. 4 j.
1838Holloway Provinc., Saddle-backed crow, the Royston, or sea-crow, so called from its mixture of black and grey feathers. Sussex. 1894R. B. Sharpe Birds Gt. Brit. I. 12 The Hooded, or Saddle-backed Crows. 1895J. G. Millais Breath from Veldt vii. 142 Here also are a big flock of saddle-backed Jabiru storks (Mycteria senegalensis). 1927H. H. T. Jackson Taxon. Rev. Amer. Long-Tailed Shrews 69 A specimen of the American saddle-backed shrew..was mentioned as early as 1772. |