Talk:clench
I spotted the use of clench below, where it seems to mean clinch: I'm not sure whether this is a general alternative spelling, or a dialect rendering (since much of this novel's dialogue is written in Irish dialect).
- 1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard
- 'Nothing, as I suppose; I'll see her to-day; there's nothing to tell; but something, I think, to be done; it hasn't been set about rightly; 'tis a botched business hitherto—that's in my judgment.'
'Yet 'tis rather a strong case,' answered Mr. Lowe, superciliously.
'Rather a strong case, so it is, but I'll clench it, Sir; it ought to be certain.'
- 'Nothing, as I suppose; I'll see her to-day; there's nothing to tell; but something, I think, to be done; it hasn't been set about rightly; 'tis a botched business hitherto—that's in my judgment.'
- 1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard
Equinox ◑ 17:35, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
RFV discussion: December 2018–January 2019
The following information has failed Wiktionary's verification process (permalink).
Failure to be verified means that insufficient eligible citations of this usage have been found, and the entry therefore does not meet Wiktionary inclusion criteria at the present time. We have archived here the disputed information, the verification discussion, and any documentation gathered so far, pending further evidence.
Do not re-add this information to the article without also submitting proof that it meets Wiktionary's criteria for inclusion.
Sense 1 says "To squeeze; to grip or hold tightly"; that's fine. I am challenging sense 2: "To move two parts of something against each other", with the example of bruxism. I think this is a confusion: bruxism requires clenching the jaw so that the teeth can make contact, but the subsequent friction/rubbing is not the clenching part. I checked a recent Chambers Dictionary (c.2005) and it has no such sense. Equinox ◑ 08:57, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- I agree. This might be a job for the OED.
- Also, the entry could stand some revision. It misses senses, eg clinch/clench a nail, omits transitive/intransitive distinctions, etc. “clench”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC. shows the number and complexity of older senses. DCDuring (talk) 16:53, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 19:32, 3 January 2019 (UTC)