What is a tail? It would seem that the answer to this question is obvious - this is a part of the body in animals and birds. But the fact is that this lexeme, being used in a figurative sense, has many shades of interpretation. About what a tail is in a direct and figurative sense, will be discussed in the article.
Let's look at the dictionary
There you can find many variants of the lexical meaning of the word "tail". Here are some of them.
- An anatomical term that refers to an appendage of the back of an animal's torso or a narrowed back.
- In birds, this is an elongated tuft of feathers located at the rear end of their body.
- In root crops, such as radish, the superficial part of the root. As well as a thin bottom end.
To understand the meaning of the word "tail", let's move on to its use in a figurative sense.
Other values
In a figurative sense, the word being studied means the following.
- The tip of some thin long object orsome kind of appendage attached to something on purpose. For example, the tail of a kite.
- One of the styles of hairstyles, which is long hair that is pulled together at the back of the head with something.
- In colloquial speech - a train, the back of the hem of a long skirt or dress. As a rule, dragging on the floor.
- Stroke at a number or letter.
- Anything that extends or follows any object, while resembling a tail. For example, a trace from the movement of a ship on the water.
- The final back of the detachment, column, caravan that are in motion.
Continuing to study what a tail is, let's consider other figurative meanings of this lexeme.
Other interpretations
Here are some more figurative meanings.
- A luminous, light streak left, for example, by a rocket or a comet.
- In an ironic context - one who follows someone relentlessly enters his constant environment.
- A line of people standing behind each other, like a long line.
- Part, the remainder of some unfinished work, some deeds. This is what they call student debt.
- In geology, a special term for waste rock, waste that remains in the process of mineral processing. As well as light, small pieces of ore carried away by water during washing.
However, the figurative meanings of the studied lexeme do not end there, let's also talk about others.
A few more figurative meanings
Among them are the following.
- In criminal jargon, this is the name of an agent or member of the secret police, spy, filer.
- A special term for furriers, denoting a bunch of skins - mustel, sable, squirrel.
- Regional word referring to fish caught or prepared for human consumption.
- In engineering, a device used to set the wings of a windmill or a wind turbine into the wind.
- An obsolete colloquial word that refers to gossip or gossip.
In conclusion of the consideration of the question of what a tail is, let's study the origin of the word.
Etymology
Derived from the Proto-Slavic language, from which they also formed:
- Old Russian “tail” and “tail”, the latter meaning “to whip, punish”;
- Russian and Bulgarian horsetail;
- Belarusian "tail";
- Serbo-Croatian “khȍst”, which means “bunch”;
- Slovenian họ̑st - "forest", "deadwood", "thicket", hvȏst - "bunch", "tail" and hvọ̑šč, meaning "bundle of straw".
It is considered related to the Armenian ẋot, the meanings of which are “meadow”, “grass”, “pasture”.
