Spin , n.
1. The act
of spinning; as, the spin of a top; a spin a bicycle. [Colloq.]
2.
(Kinematics) Velocity of rotation about some specified axis.
Spin (?), v. i. 1. To
practice spinning; to work at drawing and twisting threads; to make yarn or
thread from fiber; as, the
woman knows how to spin; a
machine or jenny spins with great exactness.
They neither
know to spin, nor care to toll.
Prior. 2. To move round
rapidly; to whirl; to revolve, as a
top or a spindle, about its axis.
Round about him spun the landscape,
Sky and forest reeled together.
Longfellow.
With a whirligig of jubilant mosquitoes spinning about each head.
G. W. Cable. 3. To stream or
issue in a thread or a small current or jet; as, blood spinsfrom a vein. Shak.
4. To move swifty; as, to spin along the road in a carriage, on a bicycle, etc.
[Colloq.]
Spin (?), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Spun (?) (Archaic
imp. Span (&?;)); p. pr. & vb.
n. Spinning.]
[AS.
spinnan; akin to D. & G. spinnen, Icel. & Sw.
spinna, Dan. spinde, Goth. spinnan, and probably to E. span. √170. Cf. Span, v. t., Spider.]
1. To draw
out, and twist into threads, either by the
hand or machinery; as, to spin wool, cotton, or flax; to
spin goat's hair; to produce by drawing out and twisting a fibrous material.
All the yarn
she [Penelope] spun in Ulysses' absence did but fill Ithaca full of moths.
Shak. 2. To draw out tediously; to form by a slow process, or by degrees; to extend to a great length; -- with out; as, to spin out large volumes on a subject.
Do you mean that story is tediously spun out?
Sheridan. 3. To protract; to spend by delays; as, to spin out the day in idleness.
By one delay
after another they spin out their whole lives.
L'Estrange.
4. To cause to turn
round rapidly; to whirl; to twirl; as, to
spin a top.
5. To form (a web, a cocoon,
silk, or the
like) from threads produced by the extrusion of a viscid, transparent liquid, which hardens on coming into contact with the air; -- said of the spider, the silkworm, etc.
6.
(Mech.) To shape, as malleable sheet metal, into a hollow
form, by bending or buckling it by pressing against it with a smooth
hand tool or roller while the metal revolves, as in a lathe.
To spin a yarn
(Naut.), to tell a story, esp. a
long or fabulous tale. -- To spin hay
(Mil.), to twist it into ropes for convenient carriage on an expedition. -- To spin street yarn, to gad about
gossiping. [Collog.]
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