[f. BACK adv. and sb.] Hence Backfalled ppl. a.
† 1. A ‘grace’ in old English music; see quot.
1676. Mace, Musicks Mon., I. xiv. 90. To make a Back-fall Right, you are always to strike the Precedent Letter … instead of that Letter, which is to be Back-fall’d with your Right Hand.
1878. Grove, Dict. Mus., I. 43/2. The smooth graces … include the Plain-beat or Rise, the Backfall, the Double Backfall, [etc.].
2. A fall or throw on the back in wrestling. Often fig.
1838–9. Hood’s Own, 3. No wrestler … ever received half so many back-falls as I.
1852. Dickens, Bleak Ho., xxv. He will throw him an argumentative back-fall presently.
3. A lever in the coupler of an organ.
1880. E. Hopkins, in Grove, Dict. Mus., II. 606/2. This coupler is always worked by a pedal, on pressing which the backfalls descend into position.
1881. C. Edwards, Organs, 71. Backfalls are usually made of mahogany.
