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What is "impale"

Crossword clues for impale

impale
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
impale
verb
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Delaforce was impaled on the control column, but by then his neck was broken anyway.
▪ Despite keeping such company, he did not hesitate to impale the rich and mighty on his pen.
▪ He was holding a stout branch, and impaled upon it was the bloody head of the leopard.
▪ His blue-grey eyes were as cold as a Siberian winter, and Polly felt as though she had been impaled by twin icicles.
▪ His legs were impaled with a thousand needles of pine and hemlock; hemlock cones and crabapple were strapped to his waist.
▪ I missed the door, however, and became impaled on the Frederick Hart sculpture.
▪ Women first are presented as bloodsucking threats, then impaled with gusto.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
impale

Empale \Em*pale"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Empaled; p. pr. & vb. n. Empaling.] [OF. empaler to palisade, pierce, F. empaler to punish by empalement; pref. em- (L. in) + OF. & F. pal a pale, stake. See Pale a stake, and cf. Impale.] [Written also impale.]

  1. To fence or fortify with stakes; to surround with a line of stakes for defense; to impale.

    All that dwell near enemies empale villages, to save themselves from surprise.
    --Sir W. Raleigh.

  2. To inclose; to surround. See Impale.

  3. To put to death by thrusting a sharpened stake through the body.

  4. (Her.) Same as Impale.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
impale

1520s, "to enclose with stakes, fence in," from Middle French empaler and directly from Medieval Latin impalare "to push onto a stake," from assimilated form of in- "into, in" (see in- (2)) + Latin palus "a stake, prop, stay; wooden post, pole," from PIE *pak-slo-, from root *pag-/*pak- "to fasten" (see pact). Sense of "pierce with a pointed stake" (as torture or punishment) first recorded 1610s. Related: Impaled; impaling.

Wiktionary
impale

vb. 1 to pierce with a pale; to put to death by fixing on a sharp stake. 2 more generally, to pierce (something) with any long, pointed object.

WordNet
impale

  1. v. pierce with a sharp stake or point; "impale a shrimp on a skewer" [syn: transfix, empale, spike]

  2. kill by piercing with a spear or sharp pole; "the enemies were impaled and left to die" [syn: stake]

Wikipedia
Impale

Impale may refer to:

  • Impaled (illusion), a magic trick simulating impalement
  • Impaled (band), American death metal band
  • Impalement, accidental injury, torture or execution
  • Impalement arts, a group of performing arts that includes knife throwing
  • Impalement (heraldry), a way of combining two coats-of-arms

Usage examples of "impale".

Romilda was condemned to the embraces of twelve Avars, and the third day the Lombard princess was impaled in the sight of the camp, while the chagan observed with a cruel smile, that such a husband was the fit recompense of her lewdness and perfidy.

The second mistress of the Coven turned her attention to the prow of her ship, and to the head of King Nicholas, impaled upon it.

In his voyages and travels, in describing the death of the King of Demaa at the hands of his page, Mendez Pinto says that instead of being reserved for torture, as were his successors Ravaillac, and Gerard, the slayer of William the Silent, the assassin was impaled alive with a long stake which was thrust in at his fundament and came out at the nape of his neck.

She gasped sharply as his engorged flesh impaled her, her nails digging into him.

Julius saw a gladius jerked up into a jaw from below, impaling one of the rebels.

A roll gained him the sword and saved him from two more arrows, but a third impaled his thigh and, like the first, began to work some killing magic.

The pain of remembering who Li was had come closer to killing him than the sorcerous arrow that impaled his heart, but the remorse, like his passion, was cooled in him now.

The god-blade flicked out deftly and impaled the man as he leapt down.

But linked to him she saw Moss, and he was impaled as plainly as the Salamander God.

He knew no shock at being impaled, because in the past year he had taken more than one such wound.

Bannor replied, wrenching away the scrap of parchment impaled by the quivering shaft.

How he impaled people and roasted them and boiled their heads in a kettle and skinned people and hacked them to pieces and drank their blood.

Upon this makeshift stake Li had been impaled through back and breastbone, as if he had been hurled there by a titanic force.

Treetops impaled rising mists, and the cool, damp air beneath smelled of recent rain and pine.

Sometimes he impaled guilty mothers through the breasts and speared their unfortunate babes onto them.