Rowelling

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Jabbing a horse's flanks with the small spiked wheel fixed to a spur to urge it forward
2. Prodding an animal onward by turning the toothed wheel of a spur against its side
3. Urging a mount to move faster by driving the spiked wheel of a spur into its skin

Etymology: "Rowelling" is the present participle of "rowel", the small spiked wheel at the end of a spur. The noun came into Middle English as "rowel", "rowell" or "rowelle", borrowed from Old French "roel" or "roiele", which is still present in modern French as "rouelle", meaning a little wheel or disc. Behind the French lies Late Latin "rotella", a diminutive of Latin "rota", "wheel", so the spur's rowel is literally a little wheel. The rowel is the toothed or spiked disc that a rider turns against a horse's flank to prompt it forward. Because the word is a doublet of "rotella", English also has a separate, more direct descendant of that Latin diminutive, which shows that the same small wheel reached the language twice by different routes. To rowel a horse is to spur it with exactly this device, so the verb carries the image of a tiny wheel turning against the animal's side.

Synonyms: spur, goad, prod