WATTLE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Wattle

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/wˈɑtəl/ Listen

noun

Wattle n.

1.

A twig or flexible rod; hence, a hurdle made of such rods. "And there he built with wattles from the marsh A little lonely church in days of yore."

2.

A rod laid on a roof to support the thatch.

3.

(Zool.)

(a)

A naked fleshy, and usually wrinkled and highly colored, process of the skin hanging from the chin or throat of a bird or reptile.

(b)

Barbel of a fish.

4.

(a)

The astringent bark of several Australian trees of the genus Acacia, used in tanning; called also wattle bark.

5.

Material consisting of wattled twigs, withes, etc., used for walls, fences, and the like. "The pailsade of wattle."

6.

(Bot.) In Australasia, any tree of the genus Acacia; so called from the wattles, or hurdles, which the early settlers made of the long, pliable branches or of the split stems of the slender species. The bark of such trees is also called wattle. See also Savanna wattle, under Savanna.

Wattle turkey. (Zool.) Same as Brush turkey.

verb

Wattle v. t. (past & past part. wattled; pres. part. wattling)

1.

To bind with twigs.

2.

To twist or interweave, one with another, as twigs; to form a network with; to plat; as, to wattle branches.

3.

To form, by interweaving or platting twigs. "The folded flocks, penned in their wattled cotes."

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Etymology of 'Wattle'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Wattle" Quotes from Famous Books

... little village hard by. The village, like all the numerous other ones that we came to in the next few days, was inclosed in a zareba, or wall of tangled thorn branches that encircled the village. Within the wall were a number of low houses, six feet high, built of mud and wattle; and within the houses, spilling over plentifully, were large numbers of children and babies and a few women. A gateway of tangled boughs led into the inclosure, while in one part of the village were the curious woven wickerwork granaries in which the community ...

— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon

... that the gorgeous sunset was finished and the sky had grown grey with night before we reached the foot of the koppie. Yet the last rays of the sinking orb had shown me something as they died. There on the slope of the hill stood some mud and wattle houses, such as I had ordered to be built, and near to them several white-capped wagons. Only I did not see any smoke rising from those houses as there should have been at this hour of the day, when ...

— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard

... by the peculiar disposition of the walls whisks the rude wattle sails around in the most lively manner. Forty of these mills are in operation at Tabbas; and to see them all in full swing, making a loud "sweeshing" noise as they revolve, is a most extraordinary sight. Aside from ...

— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... orderly and diligent fashion under their superior's direction, had built a chapel, a dormitory, a dining-hall, store-houses, barns,—and the community grew. The building was done first of rough stone and wattle-work after the manner of the country, but later of good cut stone. Half the countryside had been employed there when the chapel was building. They had drained the marsh for their meadow-land, their young trees were growing finely, their vineyard ...

— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey

... inch of his life. A witness under examination—after graphically describing how one of the prisoners had beaten the poor man "wid a stone, and he lying senseless in the road;" how another had hit the "crater wid a thick wattle;" and how a third had kicked him in the back—was asked what one Michael O'Flannagan, another of the prisoners, had done. "Begorra, your honour," said the witness, "devil a hap'orth was Micky doing at all, at all; he was just walking round searching ...

— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn

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