running noose

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running noose

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Noun

running noose - a loop formed in a cord or rope by means of a slipknot; it binds tighter as the cord or rope is pulled

slip noose, noose

clench, clinch - a small slip noose made with seizing

hangman's halter, hangman's rope, hempen necktie, halter, hemp - a rope that is used by a hangman to execute persons who have been condemned to death by hanging

lariat, reata, riata, lasso - a long noosed rope used to catch animals

slipknot - a knot at the end of a cord or rope that can slip along the cord or rope around which it is made

loop - anything with a round or oval shape (formed by a curve that is closed and does not intersect itself)

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The Gaucho, when he is going to use the lazo, keeps a small coil in his bridle-hand, and in the other holds the running noose which is made very large, generally having a diameter of about eight feet.

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I know well that in certain countries, particularly in the Andaman Islands, the negroes never hesitate to attack them with a dagger in one hand and a running noose in the other; but I also know that few who affront those creatures ever return alive.

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That makes a man accursed, And Fate will use a running noose

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Instantly the old man slipped the running noose over one of the lad's wrists, took a couple of half hitches about his other wrist, and knotted the cord.