gibber2 (giber)

[ 2508 plants, appar. a hoe: see gibl and jib1, the latter of which, in the sense of a projecting beam or arm of a crane,' comes very near the sense of gibbet. ] 1. A kind of gallows; a wooden structure consisting of an upright post with an arm projecting from the top, on which malefactors were formerly hanged in chains; sometimes, as the famous gibbet of Montfaucon, near Paris, a considerable structure with numerous uprights of masonry, connected by several tiers of cro -beams, and with pits beneath it in which the remains were cast when they fell from the chains; hence, a gallows of any form. Unle a man would marry a gallows, and beget young gibbets, I never saw one so prone [to death]. Shak ., Cymbeline, v. 4. Where Honour and Justice most oddly contribute, To ease Hero's Pains by a Halter and Gibbet . Prior, The Thief and the Cordelier. His grants were from the aggregate and consolidated funds of judgments iniquitously legal, and from po e ions voluntarily surrendered by the lawful proprietors with the gibbet at the door. Burke , To a Noble Lord. 2. The projecting beam of a crane which sustains the pulleys and the weight to be lifted; a jib.-3. A great cudgel, such as are thrown at trees to beat down the fruit. Grose. [Prov. Eng.] gibbet1 (jib'et), v. t. [ Some Inns still gibbet their Signs acro a Town. Bourne's Pop. Antiq . (1777), p. 389. Here [in the kitchen) is no every-day cheerfulne of cooking-range, but grotesque andirons wading into the bristling embers, and a long crane with villainous pots gibbeted upon it. Howells , Venetian Life, vii. 2. Figuratively, to set forth to public gaze; expose to ridicule, scorn, infamy, or the like. Thus [he] unknowingly gibbeted himself into infamy, when he might have otherwise quietly retired into obliv- ion. Goldsmith, Citizen of the World, xii. Then where's the wrong, to gibbet high the name Of fools and knaves already dead to shame? E ay on Satire , i. 160. gibbet2t, n . An error for gigot , a shoulder of mutton. A good sauce for a gibbet of mutton. gibe