ˈfive-ˌfinger
[OE. f{iacu}ffingre wk. fem. (sense 1), f. f{iacu}f five + finger.]
1. A name for various plants. a. The cinquefoil (Potentilla reptans and other species). b. The oxlip (Primula elatior). c. Lotus corniculatus.
| c 1000 Sax. Leechd. III. 123 Ac ceowe hwytes cuduwys sæd & fiffingran ælce dæᵹ ær he etan. a 1825 Forby Voc. E. Anglia 114 Five-fingers, oxlips, primula elatior. 1845 S. Judd Margaret iii. (1851) II. 295 The leaves of the five-finger draw together to shelter the flower when it rains. 1866 Treas. Bot., Five-fingers, potentilla reptans and canadensis. |
d. Any of several New Zealand trees with five-lobed leaves.
| 1926 Trans. N.Z. Inst. LVI. 701 Nothopanax arboreum, five-finger. 1960 B. Crump Good Keen Man 32 There wasn't a live five-finger or mangeo left in the valley. |
2. A popular name for a species of star-fish.
| 1678 Phillips, Five-finger, a Fish resembling a Spur⁓rowel, which gets into Oysters, when they open and sucks them out. 1850 Hawthorne Scarlet L. xv. (1883) 213 She..made prize of several five-fingers. |
† 3. Card-playing. The five of trumps. Also
five-fingers.
Obs.| 1611 Chapman May-Day v. ii. Wks. 1873 II. 400, I..lost it [the set] hauing the varlet and the fiue finger to make two tricks. 1674 Cotton Gamester xiii. 123 The five fingers (alias, five of trumps) is the best Card in the pack. |
4. Comb. five-finger discount U.S. slang, the activity or proceeds of stealing or of shop-lifting;
five-finger exercise, a piece of music written for the purpose of affording practice in the movement of the fingers in pianoforte playing; also
transf. and
fig., something very easy;
five-finger-grass = 1 a;
five-finger-tied a. (
nonce-wd.), ? tied with all the fingers of the hand.
| 1966 J. M. Brewer in A. Dundes Mother Wit (1973) 241/2 *Five-finger discount (stealing) pays off. 1976 Lieberman & Rhodes Compl. CB Handbk. v. 119 The perfect ‘gift’ for the ‘midnight shopper’ looking for a ‘five-finger discount’. 1983 Neaman & Silver Dict. Euphemisms 184 If it fell off the back of a lorry.., Americans might describe it in CB English as a five finger discount (stolen merchandise). |
| 1903 Daily Chron. 20 July 3/3 Teaching small pupils the *five-finger exercises. 1936 T. S. Eliot Coll. Poems 1909–35 145 (title of series of short poems) Five-Finger Exercises. 1959 W. Golding Free Fall xii. 234 Leave happiness to the others, Sammy. It's a five-finger exercise. 1963 B. W. Aldiss Airs of Earth 64 Early news bulletins had spoken of rioting and arrests here and there, but these were mere five-finger exercises for what was to come. |
| 1640 Parkinson Theat. Bot. 398 In English Cinkefoile..and *five finger grasse, or five leafed grasse. 1879 Prior Plant-n., Five-finger-grass or Five-leaf, a plant so called from its five leaflets, potentilla reptans. |
| 1606 Shakes. Tr. & Cr. v. ii. 157 And with another knot *fiue finger-tied, The fractions of her faith..are bound to Diomed. |
Hence
five-fingering vbl. n. (see
quot.).
| 1889 A. T. Pask Eyes Thames 58 They go out ‘five-fingering’, i.e. catching star-fish for manure. |