Word Direct Answers

What does "beetle" mean?

Beetle: A machine in which fabrics are subjected to a hammering process while passing over rollers, as in cotton mills; -- called also beetling machine. Knight.

Additional senses

  1. 2.To beat with a heavy mallet.
  2. 3.To finish by subjecting to a hammering process in a beetle or beetling machine; as, to beetle cotton goods.
  3. 4.Any insect of the order Coleoptera, having four wings, the outer pair being stiff cases for covering the others when they are folded up. See Coleoptera. Beetle mite (Zoöl.), one of many species of mites, of the family Oribatidæ, parasitic on beetles. -- Black beetle, the common large black cockroach (Blatta orientalis).
  4. 5.To extend over and beyond the base or support; to overhang; to jut. To the dreadful summit of the cliff That beetles o'er his base into the sea. Shak. Each beetling rampart, and each tower sublime. Wordsworth.

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