pigeon-hole

pigeon-hole (plural pigeon-holes)

1. Alternative form of pigeonhole.
   • 1614 November 10 (first performance; Gregorian calendar), Beniamin Iohnson [i.e., Ben Jonson], Bartholmew Fayre: A Comedie, , London: I B for Robert Allot, , published 1631, →OCLC, Act IIII, scene iv, page 61:

     ovvne vvith him in his Maieſties name, dovvne, dovvne vvith him, and carry him avvay, to the pigeon-holes.

   • 1796, Edmund Burke, A Letter from the Right Honourable Edmund Burke to a Noble Lord, on the Attacks Made upon Him and His Pension, , London: J. Owen, , and F and C Rivington, , →OCLC, page 63:

     Abbé [Emmanuel Joseph] Sieyès has vvhole neſts of pigeon-holes full of conſtitutions ready made, ticketed, ſorted, and numbered; ſuited to every ſeaſon and every fancy; […]

   • 1862, George Augustus Sala, “The Ship-chandler. A Story of a Seaport One Hundred Years Ago. Chapter III. Evil upon Evil.”, in The Ship Chandler and Other Tales, London: Ward and Lock, , →OCLC, page 48:

     Blank ink and red ink, pounce, wafers, wax, pens, seals, imbibing-paper, rulers, files, were all there; pegs for hats, shelves and hooks, pigeon-holes full of samples of sugar, of rice, tobacco, coffee, and the like: all the dull paraphernalia of a trader's elaboratory.

   • 1869, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VIII, in The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress; , Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company. , →OCLC, page 80:

     The general size of a store in Tangier is about that of an ordinary shower-bath in a civilized land. […] You can rent a whole block of these pigeon-holes for fifty dollars a month.

   • 1878 January–December, Thomas Hardy, “The People at Blooms-End Make Ready”, in The Return of the Native , volume I, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., , published 1878, →OCLC, book II (The Arrival), pages 246–248:

     The loft was lighted by a semicircular hole, though which the pigeons crept to their lodgings in the same high quarters of the premises; […] 'Dear Clym, I wonder how your face looks now?' she said, gazing abstractedly at the pigeon-hole, which admitted the sunlight so directly upon her brown hair and transparent tissues that it almost seemed to shine through her.

   • 1879, J A H Murray, Address to the Philological Society, page 8; quoted in “Pigeon-hole, sb.”, in James A H Murray [et al.], editors, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volumes VII (O–P), London: Clarendon Press, 1884–1928, →OCLC, page 846, column 3:

     This has been fitted with blocks of pigeon-holes, 1029 in number, for the reception of the alphabetically arranged slips.

   • 1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 2, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section I, page 39:

     e walked across Hawthorn Tree Court on his way to the porter's lodge. […] At the lodge he cleared his pigeon-hole.

pigeon-hole (third-person singular simple present pigeon-holes, present participle pigeon-holing, simple past and past participle pigeon-holed)

1. Alternative form of pigeonhole.
   • 1879, J A H Murray, Address to the Philological Society; quoted in “Pigeon-hole, v.”, in James A H Murray [et al.], editors, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volumes VII (O–P), London: Clarendon Press, 1884–1928, →OCLC, page 847, column 1:

     I had proposed to pigeon-hole the walls of the drawing-room for the reception of the dictionary material.

   • 1902 October, Jack London, chapter VII, in A Daughter of the Snows, Philadelphia, Pa.: J B Lippincott Company, →OCLC, page 74:

     He prided himself on his largeness when he granted that there were three kinds of women […] Not that he pigeon-holed Frona according to his inherited definitions. He refused to classify her at all. He did not dare.

   • 1910, Angus Hamilton, Herbert H Austin, Masatake Terauchi, “Sanitation and Water Works”, in Korea: Its History, Its People, and Its Commerce (Oriental Series; XIII), Boston, Mass.; Tokyo: J. B. Millet Company, →OCLC, page 294:

     everal laws and regulations were enacted for the prevention of cholera, typhoid fever, dysentery, and diphtheria. These laws were not carried into effect: they were pigeon-holed.

   • 1937 July, P G Wodehouse, “Anslem Gets His Chance”, in Eggs, Beans and Crumpets, London: Herbert Jenkins , published 26 April 1940, →OCLC, page 154:

     "Putting the prophet Hosea to one side for the moment and temporarily pigeon-holing the children of Adullam," interrupted Myrtle, "what are we going to do about this?"

   • 1961 February, “Talking of Trains: The White Paper”, in Trains Illustrated, London: Ian Allan Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 65:

     The Select Committee's recommendation that those which the railways are required to provide on grounds of national interest or social needs should be subsidised by the state has obviously been pigeon-holed.