Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Web?

\Web\, n. [OE. webbe, AS. webba. See {Weave}.] A weaver. [Obs.] --Chaucer.
\Web\, n. [OE. web, AS. webb; akin to D. web, webbe, OHG. weppi, G. gewebe, Icel. vefr, Sw. v["a]f, Dan. v[ae]v. See {Weave}.] 1. That which is woven; a texture; textile fabric; esp., something woven in a loom. Penelope, for her Ulysses' sake, Devised a web her wooers to deceive. --Spenser. Not web might be woven, not a shuttle thrown, or penalty of exile. --Bancroft. 2. A whole piece of linen cloth as woven. 3. The texture of very fine thread spun by a spider for catching insects at its prey; a cobweb. ``The smallest spider's web.'' --Shak. 4. Fig.: Tissue; texture; complicated fabrication. The somber spirit of our forefathers, who wove their web of life with hardly a . . . thread of rose-color or gold. --Hawthorne. Such has been the perplexing ingenuity of commentators that it is difficult to extricate the truth from the web of conjectures. --W. Irving. 5. (Carriages) A band of webbing used to regulate the extension of the hood. 6. A thin metal sheet, plate, or strip, as of lead. And Christians slain roll up in webs of lead. --Fairfax. Specifically: (a) The blade of a sword. [Obs.] The sword, whereof the web was steel, Pommel rich stone, hilt gold. --Fairfax. (b) The blade of a saw. (c) The thin, sharp part of a colter. (d) The bit of a key. 7. (Mach. & Engin.) A plate or thin portion, continuous or perforated, connecting stiffening ribs or flanges, or other parts of an object. Specifically: (a) The thin vertical plate or portion connecting the upper and lower flanges of an lower flanges of an iron girder, rolled beam, or railroad rail. (b) A disk or solid construction serving, instead of spokes, for connecting the rim and hub, in some kinds of car wheels, sheaves, etc. (c) The arm of a crank between the shaft and the wrist. (d) The part of a blackmith's anvil between the face and the foot. 8. (Med.) Pterygium; -- called also {webeye}. --Shak. 9. (Anat.) The membrane which unites the fingers or toes, either at their bases, as in man, or for a greater part of their length, as in many water birds and amphibians. 10. (Zo["o]l.) The series of barbs implanted on each side of the shaft of a feather, whether stiff and united together by barbules, as in ordinary feathers, or soft and separate, as in downy feathers. See {Feather}. {Pin and web} (Med.), two diseases of the eye, caligo and pterygium; -- sometimes wrongly explained as one disease. See {Pin}, n., 8, and {Web}, n., 8. ``He never yet had pinne or webbe, his sight for to decay.'' --Gascoigne. {Web member} (Engin.), one of the braces in a web system. {Web press}, a printing press which takes paper from a roll instead of being fed with sheets. {Web system} (Engin.), the system of braces connecting the flanges of a lattice girder, post, or the like.
\Web\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Webbed}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Webbing}.] To unite or surround with a web, or as if with a web; to envelop; to entangle.