pocketknife
nounEtymology From pocket + knife.
1
A knife small enough for carrying safely and handily in a pocket; usually a folding knife (with blades or tools that the user can fold or retract into the handle).
- Jimmy had a pocketknife, and he wandered into the drawing-room with it one day, alone, and reduced ten thousand dollars' worth of furniture to an indeterminable value in rather less than three-quarters of an hour.1878, Mark Twain, Tom Sawyer Abroad; About Magnanimous-Incident Literature:
- The Army, the Navy, the Maritime Commission, and Lend-Lease demanded more and more pocketknives — for demolition kits, medical kits, aviators’ kits, electricians’ kits; knives with tools, knives with marlin spikes. The pocketknife attained a new status — as indispensable equipment for all men in uniform.1944, Alfred Lief, Camillus: The Story of an American Small Business:
- Related terms
- clasp-knife