fan-tail, n.
(ˈfænteɪl)
[f. fan n.1 + tail.]
1. A tail or lower end in the shape of a fan.
| 1728 Swift Ladies at Sot's Hole, We who wear our wigs With fan-tail and with snake. 1862 Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc. XXIII. 214 Turning the butt-end [of a sheaf] upwards, spreading out the ears, and making a sort of ‘fantail’. |
2. A variety of the domestic pigeon, so called from the form of its tail. Also fantail-pigeon.
| 1735 J. Moore Columbarium 54 They [pigeons] are call'd by some Fan-Tails. 1767 S. Paterson Another Trav. II. 148 The..fan-tails and the..powters are of my breed! 1840 Dickens Barn. Rudge (1849) 2/1 Runts, fantails, tumblers, and pouters. 1859 Darwin Orig. Spec. i. (1878) 16 The fantail has thirty or even forty tail feathers, instead of twelve or fourteen. 1884 May Crommelin Brown-Eyes i. 3 The grazing deer, and the proud fantail pigeons. |
3. A genus (Rhipidura) of Birds found in Australia and New Zealand.
| 1848 in Maunder Treas. Nat. Hist. 1860 A. S. Atkinson Jrnl. 27 Oct. in Richmond-Atkinson Papers (1960) I. 645 Found a fantail nest (young ones) & a riroriro's with two young ones & an egg. 1882 W. L. Buller Man. Birds N.Z. 26 The Pied Fantail, ever flitting about with broadly-expanded tail.., is one of the most pleasing and attractive objects in the New Zealand forest. 1935 J. Guthrie Little Country xxiii. 356 A fantail perched on a twig near them and flirted its feathers. |
4. a. Mech. A kind of joint. Cf. dove-tail.
| 1858 in Simmonds Dict. Trade. |
b. = fan n.1 6 c.
| 1934 Archit. Rev. LXXVI. 166/3 The elaborate invention of an ingenious Scot, by name Meikle, who, in 1750, conceived a method of turning the mill automatically so that the ‘sails’, ‘sweep’, ‘arms’—whatever pet name you care to employ—always faced the wind. It—the invention—was known as a ‘fantail’, and consisted of a fan of six to ten blades... Mounted on a spindle, and so arranged that if the wind should veer slightly, it strikes the ‘fan⁓tail’ which turns the mill through appropriate gearing until such time as the sails face the wind again. 1949 K. S. Woods Rural Crafts Eng. ii. iv. 74 By these three inventions—automatic sails, fan-tail, and governor—the wind itself has been used to counteract its own fickle and varying moods in man's service. |
c. Naut. ‘The projecting part of the stern of a yacht or other small vessel when it extends unusually far over the water abaft the stern post’ (Cent. Dict. 1889); so extended to larger craft. (Cf. overhang n.)
| 1882 Harper's Mag. LXIV. 174/2 The stalactites of ice..at the start lent the wheel and ‘fan-tail’ a novel beauty. 1943 J. Steinbeck Once there was War (1959) 206 The boat..threw out a curving V of wake and boiled the water a little under the fantail. 1948 R. de Kerchove Internat. Mar. Dict. 252/2 Fantail stern, a type of yacht stern in which the shell planking or plating sweeps up to a sharp point to join the deck planking... This type of stern has been almost abandoned in recent years. 1955 C. S. Forester Good Shepherd 70 Krause strode out on the wing of the bridge as the..gun at the fantail went off. 1957 Jane's Fighting Ships 1957–58 424 The aircraft crane on the fantail has not the capacity to handle heavy boats. |
5. (See quot. 1874.)
| 1858 in Simmonds Dict. Trade, Fantail, a joint; a gas burner. 1874 Knight Dict. Mech., Fan-tail..a form of gas-burner in which the burning jet has an arched form. |
6. attrib., as fan-tail-hat, also, simply, fan-tail, a coal-heaver's hat, a sou'wester; fan-tail gentleman, a wearer of such a hat, a coal-heaver.
| 1810 Sporting Mag. XXXVI. 243 The two fan-tail Gentlemen soon gave in. 1850 P. Crook War of Hats 47 Those heavers, too, of coals, with smutted face And fantail hats. 1877 J. Greenwood Dick Temple II. vii. 220, I fancy I see you..with knee-breeches and calves and a ‘fantail’, shouldering an inky sack. |
Hence fan-tail v. intr. Of a whale: To work its tail like a fan. fan-tailed a., having a fan-tail.
| 1812 H. & J. Smith Rej. Addr., Arch. Atoms 154 The dustman..doffs his fan-tail'd hat. 1851 H. Melville Whale xxxvi. 179 Does he fan-tail a little curious before he goes down? 1868 Wood Homes without H. xi. 211 A rather pretty bird the Fan-tailed Warbler. |