# shin

Pronunciation: say "SHIN" /ʃɪn/

## Noun

1. The front part of the leg below the knee, lying over the shinbone.
   - Simple: The front part of your leg between the knee and the ankle.
   - _He scraped his shin climbing over the wooden fence._
   - _The defender took a hard kick to the shins during the game._
2. The twenty-first letter of many Semitic alphabets and abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, and Arabic.
   - Simple: The twenty-first letter in Hebrew, Arabic, and several other Semitic alphabets.
   - _In Hebrew script, shin is written with three upward strokes._
   - _Many Semitic scripts place shin near the end of their letter order._
5. A fishplate, a steel plate bolted across the ends of two adjoining railway rails to join them.
   - Simple: A metal bar that joins the ends of two railway rails together.
   - _The maintenance team replaced a rusted shin where the two rails met._
   - _Each joint along the line was secured with a steel shin and four bolts._

## Verb

3. To climb up or lower yourself down a mast, tree, or rope by gripping it with the arms and legs, without steps or spurs.
   - Simple: To climb up or down a pole, tree, or rope by gripping it with your arms and legs.
   - _Boys would shin up the lamppost to retrieve a stuck kite._
   - _She shinned up the drainpipe to climb through the open window._
4. To strike a person or object with the shin.
   - Simple: To hit someone or something with the front of your lower leg.
   - _The striker managed to shin the ball into the net from close range._
   - _She shinned the chair leg as she rushed past it._
6. To hurry about borrowing money on a short-term basis, as when scrambling to make a payment. *(slang, US)*
   - Simple: To rush around quickly borrowing money to make a payment.
   - _With payday still a week off, he shinned about town trying to cover the debt._
   - _Merchants often had to shin for funds when a large note fell due._

## Origin

From Middle English schyne, from Old English scinu, going back to Proto-West Germanic *skinu and Proto-Germanic *skinō. It is related to West Frisian skine, Dutch scheen, and German Schiene, but is not connected to 'skin'.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/shin (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).