What is "hinge"

Hinge \Hinge\, n. [OE. henge, heeng; akin to D. heng, LG. henge, Prov. E. hingle a small hinge; connected with hang, v., and Icel. hengja to hang. See Hang.]

1. The hook with its eye, or the joint, on which a door, gate, lid, etc., turns or swings; a flexible piece, as a strip of leather, which serves as a joint to turn on.

   The gate self-opened wide, On golden hinges turning.
   --Milton.

2. That on which anything turns or depends; a governing principle; a cardinal point or rule; as, this argument was the hinge on which the question turned.

3. One of the four cardinal points, east, west, north, or south. [R.] When the moon is in the hinge at East. --Creech. Nor slept the winds . . . but rushed abroad. --Milton. Hinge joint.

   1. (Anat.) See Ginglymus.

   2. (Mech.) Any joint resembling a hinge, by which two pieces are connected so as to permit relative turning in one plane.

      To be off the hinges, to be in a state of disorder or irregularity; to have lost proper adjustment.
      --Tillotson.

Hinge \Hinge\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Hinged; p. pr. & vb. n. Hinging.]

1. To attach by, or furnish with, hinges.

2. To bend. [Obs.]
   --Shak.

Hinge \Hinge\, v. i. To stand, depend, hang, or turn, as on a hinge; to depend chiefly for a result or decision or for force and validity; -- usually with on or upon; as, the argument hinges on this point.
--I. Taylor

c.1300, "the axis of the earth;" late 14c. as "movable joint of a gate or door," not found in Old English, cognate with Middle Dutch henghe "hook, handle," Middle Low German henge "hinge," from Proto-Germanic *hanhan (transitive), *hangen (intransitive), from PIE *konk- "to hang" (see hang (v.)). The notion is the thing from which a door hangs.

c.1600, "to bend," from hinge (n.). Meaning "turn on, depend" is from 1719. Related: Hinged; hinging.

n. 1 A jointed or flexible device that allows the pivoting of a door etc. See also pintel. 2 A stamp hinge, a folded and gummed paper rectangle for affixing postage stamps in an album. 3 A principle, or a point in time, on which subsequent reasonings or events depend. 4 (context statistics English) The median of the upper or lower half of a batch, sample, or probability distribution. 5 One of the four cardinal points, east, west, north, or south. vb. 1 (context transitive English) To attach by, or equip with a hinge. 2 (context intransitive English) To depend on something. 3 (context transitive archaeology English) The breaking off of the distal end of a knapped stone flake whose presumed course across the face of the stone core was truncated prematurely, leaving not a feathered distal end but instead the scar of a nearly perpendicular break. 4 (context obsolete English) To bend.

1. n. a joint that holds two parts together so that one can swing relative to the other [syn: flexible joint]

2. a circumstance upon which subsequent events depend; "his absence is the hinge of our plan"

v. attach with a hinge

A hinge is a mechanical bearing that connects two solid objects, typically allowing only a limited angle of rotation between them. Two objects connected by an ideal hinge rotate relative to each other about a fixed axis of rotation. Hinges may be made of flexible material or of moving components. In biology, many joints function as hinges like the elbow joint.

Hinge is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

• John Hinge (born 1986), Australian rules footballer
• Lucien Hinge (born 1992), Vanuatuan footballer
• Mike Hinge (1931–2003), New Zealand-born artist and illustrator
• Neha Hinge, Indian model