Etimology
From Middle English her, heer, hær, from Old English hǣr, from Proto-West Germanic *hār, from Proto-Germanic *hērą (“hair”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian Hier (“hair”), West Frisian hier (“hair”), Dutch haar (“hair”), German Low German Haar (“hair”), German Haar (“hair”), Swedish, Danish and Norwegian hår (“hair”), Icelandic hár (“hair”). Eclipsed non-native Middle English cheveler, chevelere (“hair”), borrowed from Old French chevelëure (“hair, head-hair, coiffure, wig”). The modern spelling with ai is not a regular representation of the vowel developed from Middle English. Rather, it is from Middle English here (haircloth) influenced by Old French haire.
noun
hair (countable and uncountable, plural hairs) (but usually in singular)
(countable) A pigmented filament of keratin which grows from a follicle on the skin of humans and other mammals.
(uncountable) The collection or mass of such growths growing from the skin of humans and animals, and forming a covering for a part of the head or for any part or the whole body.
(zoology, countable) A slender outgrowth from the chitinous cuticle of insects, spiders, crustaceans, and other invertebrates. Such hairs are totally unlike those of vertebrates in structure, composition, and mode of growth.
(botany, countable) A cellular outgrowth of the epidermis, consisting of one or of several cells, whether pointed, hooked, knobbed, or stellated.
(countable) Any slender, flexible outgrowth, filament, or fiber growing or projecting from the surface of an object or organism.
(countable, engineering, firearms) A locking spring or other safety device in the lock of a rifle, etc., capable of being released by a slight pressure on a hair-trigger.
(obsolete) (Can we verify(+) this sense?) Haircloth; a hair shirt.
(countable) Any very small distance, or degree; a hairbreadth.
(slang, uncountable) Complexity; difficulty; the quality of being hairy.
Examples
And draweth new delights with hoary hairs.
Threading its way out from among his grey hairs, and continuing right down one side of his tawny scorched face and neck, till it disappeared in his clothing, you saw a slender rod-like mark, lividly whitish.
In the western world, women usually have long hair while men usually have short hair.
Her abundant hair, of a dark and glossy brown, was neatly plaited and coiled above an ivory column that rose straight from a pair of gently sloping shoulders, clearly outlined beneath the light muslin frock that covered them.
Internal hairs occur in the flower stalk of the yellow frog lily .
The collection or mass of such outgrowths, filaments, or fibers growing or projecting from the surface of an object or organism.
She, ful devout and humble in hir corage, / Under hir robe of gold, that sat ful faire, / Hadde next hir flessh yclad hir in an haire.
Thenne vpon the morne whanne the good man had songe his masse / thenne they buryed the dede man / Thenne syr launcelot sayd / fader what shalle I do / Now sayd the good man / I requyre yow take this hayre that was this holy mans and putte it nexte thy skynne / and it shalle preuaylle the gretelyThen in the morning when the priest had sung mass / then they buried the dead man/ then Sir Lancelot said/ Father what shall I do / Now said the priest / I require you to take this hair that was this saint's and put it on your scalp / and it shall serve you greatly
Then in the morning when the priest had sung mass / then they buried the dead man/ then Sir Lancelot said/ Father what shall I do / Now said the priest / I require you to take this hair that was this saint's and put it on your scalp / and it shall serve you greatly
Just a little louder please—turn that knob a hair to the right.
Having said all that, those who argue that legalizing marijuana is a panacea and it solves all these social problems I think are probably overstating the case. There is a lot of hair on that policy.
verb
hair (third-person singular simple present hairs, present participle hairing, simple past and past participle haired)
(transitive) To remove the hair from.
(intransitive) To grow hair (where there was a bald spot).
(transitive) To cause to have or bear hair; to provide with hair
To string the bow for a violin.
Examples
Now know ye, that in compliance with the said proviso, we the said John Cant and John Millar do hereby declare that our said invention of a new method of tanning leather is described in the manner following : that our method of preparing hides and skins by liming, hairing, fleshing, and baiting, is the same as that in use by the most experienced tanners; that is to say: All leather that is to be dressed or curried, we use the operation of what tanners call baiting, for this reason; that the leather when curried should carry a sufficient quantity of oil, and dry a good colour.
By his method raw hides, after hairing and baiting, are converted into leather in less than thirty hours.
I took 25 hides out of the Lime with Stephens help I haired them and fleshed them
He has haired up and healed over.
It has haired over nicely. There are no bad results from it in any way whatever that I can detect.
The bald patch on his hip was hairing over and he no longer limped.
THE following classes of fiber are employed for hairing dolls : human hair, mohair, cross-bred wool, horsehair, hog-bristle, unspun cotton. Human hair is only used for hairing dolls of an extremely expensive class.
So they did three different sculptures and then ran the masks and painted them, haired them, and sent them out to us.
The winter had haired them like llamas, the sleet had worked no hardship, as a horse paws to the grass, and any concern for the outside saddle stock was needless.
The bow is now haired, and all that remains to make it ready for use is to rosin it.
The tools used for hairing a bow by various reparimen can be unlimited in their selection. A bowmaker has a different attitude toward hairing than a repairman and this I believe reflects the type of the finished job that is done.
To hair a bow, a hank of horse hair is selected and combed so that all hairs are parallel to each other.