Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Clinch

Clinch (klĭnch; 224), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Clinched; p. pr. & vb. n. Clinching.] [OE. clenchen, prop. causative of clink to cause to clink, to strike; cf. D. klinken to tinkle, rivet. See Clink.] 1. To hold firmly; to hold fast by grasping or embracing tightly. "Clinch the pointed spear." Dryden.

2. To set closely together; to close tightly; as, to clinch the teeth or the first. Swift.

3. To bend or turn over the point of (something that has been driven through an object), so that it will hold fast; as, to clinch a nail.

4. To make conclusive; to confirm; to establish; as, to clinch an argument. South.

Clinch, v. i. To hold fast; to grasp something firmly; to seize or grasp one another.

Clinch (klĭnch), n. 1. The act or process of holding fast; that which serves to hold fast; a grip; a grasp; a clamp; a holdfast; as, to get a good clinch of an antagonist, or of a weapon; to secure anything by a clinch.

2. A pun. Pope.

3. (Naut.) A hitch or bend by which a rope is made fast to the ring of an anchor, or the breeching of a ship's gun to the ringbolts.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.