Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Cudgel

Cudg′el (k?j′?l), n. [OE. kuggel; cf. G. keule club (with a round end), kugel ball, or perh. W. cogyl cudgel, or D. cudse, kuds, cudgel.] A staff used in cudgel play, shorter than the quarterstaff, and wielded with one hand; hence, any heavy stick used as a weapon.

He getteth him a grievous crabtree cudgel and . . . falls to rating of them as if they were dogs. Bunyan.

Cudgel play, a fight or sportive contest with cudgels. — To cross the cudgels, to forbear or give up the contest; — a phrase borrowed from the practice of cudgel players, who lay one cudgel over another when the contest is ended. — To take up cudgels for, to engage in a contest in behalf of (some one or something).

Cudg′el, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Cudgeled or Cudgelled (-ĕld); p. pr. & vb. n. Cudgeling or cudgelling.] To beat with a cudgel.

An he here, I would cudgel him like a dog. Shak.

To cudgel one's brains, to exercise one's wits.

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.