windpipe
(ˈwɪndpaɪp, ˈwaɪndpaɪp)
[f. wind n.1 + pipe n.1 Cf. Du. † windpijpe (Kilian).]
1. The tube which leads from the throat and (dividing into the two bronchi) conveys air to and from the lungs in breathing: = trachea 1 a. † Formerly also pl. = the trachea and bronchi collectively.
| 1530 Palsgr. 289/1 Wyndpype, sifflet de gosier. 1538 Bale God's Promises iii. C ij, Stoppe not my wynde pypes, but geue them lyberte, To sounde to thy name. 1565 Cooper Thesaurus s.v. Arteria, Aspera arteria, the wine pipe [sic]. 1581 Mulcaster Positions xv. (1888) 70 The cowgh which commeth of some cold distemperature in the windepipes. 1662 J. Bargrave Pope Alex. VII (1867) 12 Their heads, with the livers and lungs hanging by the wine⁓pipes [sic]. 1791 Boswell Johnson 19 Sept. an. 1777, When one considers what variety of sounds can be uttered by the windpipe, in the compass of a very small aperture. 1866 Ballantyne Shifting Winds ii, There was only just sufficient opening in the wind-pipe to permit of her breath passing..through her..mouth. 1874 Coues Birds N.-W. 531 The Whooping Crane has a windpipe between four and five feet long—quite as long as the bird itself. |
2. An artificial pipe or tube for conducting a blast of air. rare.
| 1688 Holme Armoury iii. v. 259/1 A Pair of Bellows..; the Wind Pipe erected. 1689 Burnet Tracts I. 94 A hole [let into a hill] which all the Summer long blows a fresh Air into the Cellar..but this Wind-pipe did not blow when I was there. |
3. attrib. and Comb.: windpipe-stretcher, jocular, a hangman; windpipe sweetbread, the thyroid gland (of a calf) used as food.
| 1617 J. Taylor (Water P.) Three Weekes Observ. B 4 b, Our Wapping windpipe-stretcher. a 1756 E. Haywood New Present (1771) 19 The fore-quarter [of veal] contains the shoulder, neck, and breast, the throat sweet-bread, and the windpipe sweetbread. |
Hence (nonce-wds.) ˈwindpipe v., trans. to utter through the windpipe, to ‘pipe’; ˈwindpiped (-paɪpt) a., supplied with pipes figured as windpipes.
| 1860 Holmes Prof. Breakf.-t. x, A city, water-veined and gas windpiped. 1895 Meredith Amazing Marr. xlv, The three guardian ladies..headed over the..town..windpiping these and similar Solan notes. |