cat-o'-nine-tails
Pluralcats-o'-nine-tails
- 1A whip with nine cords, often knotted, formerly used to flog sailors as a punishment in the navy.
The bosun's mate drew the cat-o'-nine-tails from its red baize bag before the punishment began.
Twelve lashes from the cat-o'-nine-tails left the deserter's back raw.
Note
The shipboard instrument the name was coined for: the "cat" is the scratches its knotted cords left, which looked like a cat's claw marks. William Congreve's Love for Love (1695) already threatens a sailor with one "laid cross your shoulders," and laid across the back or shoulders is still the verb the whip takes. In the plural only the first word changes: cats-o'-nine-tails.
- 2A whip of similar build made with nine leather tails, as used in British penal colonies and certain armies.
Convicts at the penal settlement dreaded the cat-o'-nine-tails kept in the guardhouse.
The sergeant laid the cat-o'-nine-tails across the deserter's shoulders at the regiment's order.
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Origin
Formed from cat + o' + nine + tails, where "cat" refers to the inflicted wounds resembling the scratches of a cat. First attested in 1695.