shaft

shäft, n anything long and straight; a stem; an arrow; a missile (esp fig); the main, upright, straight, or cylindrical part of anything; the part of a cross below the arms; the part of a column between the base and the capital; the rachis of a feather; the thill of a carriage on either side of the horse; a straight handle; a pole; a ray or beam of light; a rotating rod that transmits motion; a well-like excavation or passage; the penis (coarse slang); a woman’s body (purely as sexual object) (US coarse slang). — vt to have sexual intercourse with (a woman) (coarse slang); to dupe, swindle, treat unfairly (slang). — adj shaft’ed. — n shaft’er or shaft’-horse a horse harnessed between shafts. — n shaft’ing the action of the verb in either sense; a system of shafts. — adj shaft’less. — make a shaft or a bolt of it to venture and take what comes of it, the shaft and the bolt being the arrows of the longbow and the crossbow respectively.