(str. var.), a.

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  1.  Having three corners or angles; triangular (in plan or in cross-section).

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c. 1400.  Maundev., iii. 15. Costantynoble … is iij cornered.

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c. 1400.  Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 36. Haue a nedle þre cornerid.

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1594.  Blundevil, Exerc., III. I. (1636), 274. Of Triangles or three-cornerd figures.

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1668.  Culpepper & Cole, Barthol. Anat., I. xviii. 49. Somtimes they are three-corner’d, seldom round.

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1833.  T. Hook, Parson’s Dau., II. i. Immediately following … came a three-cornered note from Lady Gorgon.

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1855.  O. W. Holmes, Poems, 86. The old three-cornered hat.

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  b.  transf. Applied to a constituency represented by three members.

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  Such constituencies were a feature of the electoral system for the House of Commons from 1867 to 1885; each elector having the right to vote for not more than two candidates, which enabled a strong minority to elect one of the representatives.

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1882.  Ogilvie, Three-cornered constituency.

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1883.  Manch. Guard., 22 Oct., 5/2. What shall be done with the three-cornered constituencies?

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  c.  Applied to a contest, discussion, or the like, between three persons.

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1891.  Kipling, Light that Failed, xii. (1900), 197. Let us rather … consider whether Torp’s three-cornered ministrations are exactly what Dick needs just now.

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1894.  H. Gardener, Unoff. Patriot, 59. They had a three-cornered fight with Bradley’s mulatto, Ned.

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Mod.  The election in Kilmarnock Burghs was a three-cornered fight.

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  2.  a. Of a horse: Awkwardly shaped. colloq.

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1861.  Whyte-Melville, Mkt. Harb., iv. 28. The grey … and the bay, with a little three-cornered jumping hack.

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1890.  ‘R. Boldrewood,’ Col. Reformer (1891), 386. And the horses? Sell every three-cornered wretch of ’em.

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  b.  fig. Awkward, cross-grained, peevish; cf. ANGULAR a. 4. (Also quasi-adv.)

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c. 1850.  E. Farmer, Scrap Bk. (1869), 96. Matters run three-cornered.

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1876.  Geo. Eliot, Dan. Der., xxxiii. A three-cornered, impracticable fellow.

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1879.  F. W. Robinson, Coward Consc., III. xviii. This hard, three-cornered family.

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  Hence Three-corneredness, triangularity; Three-corneredwise adv., triangularly.

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1682.  T. Flatman, Heraclitus Ridens, No. 68 (1713), II. 169. A Place in Egypt, call’d Delta, from the Three-corner’dness of its Shape.

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1580.  Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, Triangulaire, three cornerdwise, or after three corners.

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