joints

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of joint.

   After the long hike, her joints ached for two full days.

   The carpenter reinforced the joints with metal brackets before assembling the frame.

   Note

   One plural covers every kind of meeting: hinged ones that rotate, rigid ones that hold fast, the knees and knuckles of a body, and the fastenings that secure a frame. A butcher's joints are cuts of meat, often rolled and tied. Along a stem, the word can name the lengths between knots or nodes rather than the knots themselves. The same spelling serves the verb form, and only position tells them apart.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of joint.

   Every morning the chef joints several birds for the day's orders.

   The mill joints the timber sections so they slot together without gaps.

   Note

   The verb runs in two opposite directions. Someone who joints boards fits them together, while a cook who joints a chicken cuts it apart where its bones meet. The object usually settles which meaning is intended, and the verb nearly always takes one. Without an object, things are said to joint when they fit together or coalesce as joints do.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2