Crossword clues for penknife
penknife
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Penknife \Pen"knife`\, n.; pl. Penknives. [Pen + knife.] A small pocketknife; formerly, a knife used for making and mending quill pens.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
n. A small pocketknife; a small knife with a blade which folds into the hand. Penknives often incorporate other tools such as corkscrews, and are generally smaller than pocketknives as a group.
WordNet
n. a small pocketknife; originally used to cut quill pens
[also: penknives (pl)]
Wikipedia
A penknife, or pen knife, is a British English term for a small folding knife. Originally, penknives were used for thinning and pointing quills to prepare them for use as dip pens and, later, for repairing or re-pointing the nib. They did not necessarily have folding blades, but resembled a scalpel or wood knife by having a short, fixed blade at the end of a long handle.
Today the word penknife is the common British English term for both a pocketknife, which can have single or multiple blades, and for multi-tools, with additional tools incorporated into the design.
Over the last hundred years there has been a proliferation of multi-function knives with multifarious blades and gadgets, including; awls, reamers, scissors, nail files, corkscrews, tweezers, toothpicks, and so on. The tradition continues with the incorporation of modern devices such as ballpoint pens, LED torches, and USB flash drives.
The most famous example of a multi-function penknife is the Swiss Army knife, some versions of which number dozens of functions and are really more of a folding multi-tool, incorporating a blade or two, than a penknife with extras.
A larger folding knife, especially one in which the blade locks into place, is often called a claspknife.
Usage examples of "penknife".
But they were going to have to come-up with something more than a little Swiss penknife before they got out of this place.
He howled, tearing himself free, almost tugging the penknife from her hands.
Before anyone else could react, Kate ran forward, brandishing her little Swiss penknife, feeling like a fool.
Kate stabbed at one of them, he smashed the penknife from her grip with a curse and then used the flat of his big hand to club her to the ground.
Gullywudes and spriggans, and a bogan or two, leapt away from where the penknife skittered across the stone floor, throwing up sparks.
He wiped the penknife dry on his pant leg and replaced it in the pencase, and took each leaf in turn, dabbing it in the blood until each had been marked.
But his penknife was a tiny thing, suitable for sharpening quills and cutting paper, not to doing battle with monstrous stone dogs.
He started working on one of the heels of the shoes, prying it loose with his penknife, until someone pounded on the back of the van.
He took down the mirror, then produced a penknife and dug into the Sheetrock.
Daniels took out a penknife and dug into the mortar between two concrete blocks.
With my penknife I had nicked out a crude slit in the lid for the coins.
He started to carefully cut around the packing tape with his penknife and peel back the several layers of brown paper.
Using his penknife, Smolinski carefully cut away the rest of the wrapper and slid the contents out onto the conference table.
The little man took out a pipe from his pocket, and a small penknife, and began to remove the dottle from the bowl.
I cut the frayed string with my penknife, broke the seal with my thumb and unfolded the sheet.