Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An instrument for gauging and adjusting machine parts; a trammel.
  • noun Accurate mechanical adjustment.
  • transitive verb To adjust or align (mechanical parts) with a trammel.
  • noun A shiny silk thread with very little twist, primarily used as a weft yarn.
  • noun A streetcar.
  • noun A streetcar line.
  • noun A cable car, especially one suspended from an overhead cable.
  • noun A four-wheeled, open, box-shaped wagon or iron car run on tracks in a coal mine.
  • transitive verb To move or convey in a tram.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun See tramway, 2.
  • To use a trammel or distance gage in order to get. two shafts, or other axes, parallel to one another, or at right angles to another axis to which both are to be perpendicular.
  • noun A machine; a contrivance.
  • noun A kind of double silk thread, in which two or move strands or singles are twisted together in a direction contrary to the twist of the singles, used for the weft or cross-threads of gros-de-Naples velvets, flowered silks, and the best varieties of silk goods. Also called shute.
  • To move or transport on a tramway.
  • To operate a tram; also, to travel by tram.
  • noun A beam or bar: as, gallows trams.
  • noun The shaft of a cart, wheelbarrow, or vehicle of any kind.
  • noun A plank road.
  • noun One of the two parallel lines of rails which form a tramway.
  • noun A tramway.
  • noun A four-wheeled car or wagon used in coal-mines, especially in the north of England, for conveying the coals from the working-places to the pit-bottom, or from the pit-mouth to the place of shipment.
  • noun Same as tram-car.
  • noun In a grinding-mill, position perpendicular to the face of the bedstone: said of a spindle. See tramming.
  • noun A device, resembling a trammel, used for shaping oval molds, etc.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Mech.) Same as trammel, n., 6.
  • noun A four-wheeled truck running on rails, and used in a mine, as for carrying coal or ore.
  • noun Prov. Eng. The shaft of a cart.
  • noun One of the rails of a tramway.
  • noun engraving A car on a horse railroad.
  • noun a car made to run on a tramway, especially a street railway car.
  • noun a flat piece of iron laid down as a rail.
  • noun (Milling) the step and support for the lower end of the spindle of a millstone.
  • noun A silk thread formed of two or more threads twisted together, used especially for the weft, or cross threads, of the best quality of velvets and silk goods.
  • intransitive verb To operate, or conduct the business of, a tramway; to travel by tramway.
  • transitive verb To convey or transport on a tramway or on a tram car.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A passenger vehicle for public use that runs on tracks in the road.
  • noun A similar vehicle for carrying materials.
  • verb transitive To transport (material) by tram.
  • noun A silk thread formed of two or more threads twisted together, used especially for the weft, or cross threads, of the best quality of velvets and silk goods.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a conveyance that transports passengers or freight in carriers suspended from cables and supported by a series of towers
  • verb travel by tram
  • noun a four-wheeled wagon that runs on tracks in a mine
  • noun a wheeled vehicle that runs on rails and is propelled by electricity

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for trammel.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, contrivance, from Old French traime, contrivance, weft, from Latin trāma, weft, woof.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Scots, shaft of a barrow, probably from Middle Flemish.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Probably from Middle Dutch trame. The popular derivation from tramway builder Benjamin Outram is false: the term pre-dated him.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Spanish trama weft, or French trame.

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