Oar (?), n [AS. ar; akin to Icel. ar, Dan. aare, Sw. åra; perh. akin to E. row, v. Cf. Rowlock.]
1.
An implement for impelling a boat, being a slender piece of timber, usually ash or spruce, with a grip or handle at one end and a broad blade at the other. The part which rests in the rowlock is called the loom.
⇒ An oar is a kind of long paddle, which swings about a kind of fulcrum, called a rowlock, fixed to the side of the boat.
2.
An oarsman; a rower; as, he is a good oar.
3. Zool.
An oarlike swimming organ of various invertebrates.
Oar cock (Zool), the water rail. [Prov. Eng.] -- Spoon oar, an oar having the blade so curved as to afford a better hold upon the water in rowing. -- To boat the oars, to cease rowing, and lay the oars in the boat. -- To feather the oars. See under Feather., v. t. -- To lie on the oars, to cease pulling, raising the oars out of water, but not boating them; to cease from work of any kind; to be idle; to rest. -- To muffle the oars, to put something round that part which rests in the rowlock, to prevent noise in rowing. -- To put in one's oar, to give aid or advice; -- commonly used of a person who obtrudes aid or counsel not invited. -- To ship the oars, to place them in the rowlocks. -- To toss the oars, To peak the oars, to lift them from the rowlocks and hold them perpendicularly, the handle resting on the bottom of the boat. -- To trail oars, to allow them to trail in the water alongside of the boat. -- To unship the oars, to take them out of the rowlocks.
© Webster 1913.
Oar, v. t. & i. [imp. & p. p. Oared (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Oaring.]
To row.
"
Oared himself."
Shak.
Oared with laboring arms.
Pope.
© Webster 1913.