tramel
nounEtymology From French tramail (“net for catching fishes”), from Medieval Latin tremaculum.
1
A net over a river to catch fish.
2
An instrument or device, sometimes of leather, more usually of rope, fitted to a horse's legs to regulate his motions and force him to amble.
- The back-band which is fit for no other use but to bear up the side ropes, should, if you tramel all four legs, be made of fine girth-web, and lined with cotton; but if you tramel but one side, then a common tape will serve, taking care that it carries the side ropes in an even line, without either rising or falling: for if it rises it shortens the side-rope, and if it falls there is danger of its entangling.1800, G. G., J. Robinsom, The Sportsman's Dictionary, R. Nobel, published 1800, page TRA:
3
Obsolete Obsolete spelling of trammel.
- Her golden lockes she roundly did uptye In breaded tramels, that no looser heares Did out of order stray about her daintie eares.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC: