sb. Also 8 catanine-tails, cat-and-nine-tails, 8–9 cat-of-nine-tails, (9 cat with nine tails). [see CAT 8: prob. the name was originally one of grim humor, in reference to its ‘scratching’ the back.]
1. A whip with nine knotted lashes; till 1881 an authorized instrument of punishment in the British navy and army.
1665. R. Head, Eng. Rogue, 14. I was daily visited by my Master, attended with a Cat of Nine-tails (as he called it) being so many small cords, with which he fleyed my buttocks.
1695. Congreve, Love for L., III. 44 (L.). If you shou’d give such Language at Sea, you’d have a Cat o’ Nine-tails laid cross your Shoulders.
1707. J. Stevens, trans. Quevedo’s Com. Wks. (1709), 208. He hung up the Catanine-tails.
1732. Gloucester Jrnl., 21 March, 2/1. One Geo. Boyde … was try’d for drinking the Pretender’s Health, found guilty, and sentenced to received 1000 Lashes with a Cat of Nine-tails.
1748. Smollett, Rod. Rand., xxvii. To whip him up with the Cat-and-nine-tails.
1763. Chron., in Ann. Reg., 90/2. The plaintiff received 300 lashes with a cat o’ nine tails.
1806–7. J. Beresford, Miseries Hum. Life (1826), XII. xxv. You would joyfully submit to the cat-and-nine-tails by way of a flapper to your dormant excitability.
1866. R. Chambers, Ess., Ser. I. 97. The disgusting operation of flaying a man alive with a cat-o’-nine-tails.
1879. Daily News, 14 Aug., 5/2. A fac-simile of a cat-o’-nine-tails used in the 75th Regiment was exhibited.
fig. a. 1726. Vanbrugh, False Friend, Prol. Plays 1759, 308 (T.).
| You dread Reformers of an impious Age, | |
| You awful Cat-a-nine Tails to the Stage, | |
| This once be just, and in our Cause engage. |
attrib. 1834. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), III. 99. What is your cat-of-nine-tails man, in a battle or a storm?
2. A bulrush. (U.S.).
1858. O. W. Holmes, Aut. Breakf.-t., 330. It swayed back and forward like a stalk of rye or a cat-o’nine-tails (bulrush) with a bobolink on it.
1883. C. F. Holder, in Harper’s Mag., Dec., 100/1. A mossy bank with overhanging ferns and cat-o’-nine-tails.
Hence Cat-o’-nine-tail v. (humorous).
1796. Southey, in Life (1849), I. 272. Must man be cat-a-ninetailed by care, until he shields himself in a shroud?
