Forms: 7 beuell, 8–9 bevil, 8– bevel; in Her. 6 beuile, 7–9 bevil(e. [App. a. OF. *bevel, not found, but implied in the mod.F. beveau, beauveau, beuveau (in Boiste’s Dict.), biveau (Littré), buveau (Cotgr., Littré, Boiste); of unknown derivation. Godefroy cites a single instance of a vb. bever, which he explains as ‘biaiser (i.e., to slope, make slanting): architectural term’; but this seems insecure. It is uncertain whether the adj. or sb. is earlier: the order here is provisional.]
A. adj.
1. Her. Of a line: Broken so as to have two equal acute alternate angles; composed of two parallel portions joined at acute angles by an intermediate piece, thus [line].
1562. Leigh, Armorie (1579), 78 b. Hee beareth party per pale Beuile, Or and purpure … He beareth party per Bend Beuile, Argent, and purpure.
2. Oblique; esp. at more than a right angle; sloping, slant, inclined from a right angle, or from a horizontal or vertical position.
c. 1600. Shaks., Sonn., cxxi. I may be straight though they them-selues be beuel.
1677. Moxon, Mech. Exerc. (1703), 89. It [the Bevil] is used … for the striking such Bevil-lines.
1679. Plot, Staffordsh., 368. The walls of the Chappel stand quite bevil to those of the Church.
1733. Tull, Horse-Hoeing Husb., xxii. 148. The Mortise is bevel. [See BEVEL EDGE, etc., in C.]
B. sb. 1. A common joiner’s and mason’s tool, consisting of a flat rule with a moveable tongue or arm stiffly jointed to one end, for setting off angles.
1611. Cotgr., Buveau, a kind of Squire or Squire-like Instrument, hauing mouable, and compasse, branches; or th’ one branch compasse and th’ other straight; some call it a Beuell.
1677. Moxon, Mech. Exerc. (1703), 89. The Bevil … having its Tongue movable upon a Center, may be set to strike Angles of any greater, or lesser numbers of Degrees.
1823. P. Nicholson, Pract. Build., 386. The Bevel is employed in drawing the soffit line on the face of the bricks.
1876. Blackie, Songs Relig. & Life, 221. Time ’tis none for square and bevel.
2. A slope from the right angle, an obtuse angle; a slope from the horizontal or vertical; a surface or part so sloping. In the mechanical arts, the defined slope or curve to which timber, etc., must be cut. (Sometimes bevel is technically applied to any angle exc. 90° and 45°.)
1677. Moxon, Mech. Exerc. (1703), 110. Any sloping Angle that is not a square, is called a Bevil.
1787. Burns, Tam Samson’s El., iii. The brethren o’ the mystic level May hing their head in wafu’ bevel.
1793. Smeaton, Edystone L., § 53. The upper bevil, or projection by way of cornice for throwing off the sea.
1851. Ruskin, Stones Ven., I. xvi. § 13. In the outlook window the outside bevel downwards is essential.
1863. Wynter, Subtle Brains, etc., 274. [It] cut the plank to the exact size and bevil it was required to take.
3. Short for bevel-wheel (see C).
1870. in Eng. Mech., 18 March, 652/3. This bevel gears with a horizontal bevel underneath the base.
C. Comb. and Attrib., as bevel-angle (see quot.); bevel edge, the oblique edge of a chisel or similar tool; hence bevel-edged a.; bevel-gear, -gearing, gear for conveying motion by means of bevel-wheels from one shaft to another at an angle (usually a right angle) with it; bevel-joint, a sloping joint for uniting pieces of timber end to end; bevel-square (see B 1); bevel-tool, a turner’s tool with a bevel-edge for forming grooves and tapers in wood; bevel-wheel, a toothed wheel whose working face, consisting of a frustum of a cone, is oblique with the axis, used to work in connection with another bevel wheel, the shafts of the two being usually at right angles to each other; bevel-ways, -wise, adv. at a bevel.
1727–51. Chambers, Cycl., *Bevel-angle is used among the workmen, to denote any other angle but those of ninety or forty-five degrees.
1833. Phillips, Fam. Cycl., 1339/1. Wheels are denominated spur, crown, or *bevel-gear, according to the direction or position of the teeth.
c. 1790. Imison, Sch. Art, I. 34. The Principle of Bevel Geer, consists in two cones, rolling on the surface of each other.
1823. P. Nicholson, Pract. Build., 120. Other modes of continuing the length of timbers or beams is, by splicing them with a long *bevel-joint.
