jawbone

• jaw bone, jaw-bone
• chawe bone, chaw-bone (obsolete)

From Middle English jawe bone, a variant of chawlbone, chawylbon, chavylbone, chavyl bon (“jaw bone”, literally “chavel bone”), see chavel-bone; equivalent to jaw +‎ bone.

• Audio (US)

  (file)

jawbone (countable and uncountable, plural jawbones)

1. (countable) The bone of the lower jaw; the mandible.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Judges 15:14–17:

     14 ¶ And when he came vnto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily vpon him, and the cordes that were vpon his armes became as flaxe that was burnt with fire, & his bands loosed from off his hands.
     15 And he found a new iawbone of an asse, and put foorth his hand, and tooke it, and slewe a thousand men therewith.
     16 And Samson said, With the iawbone of an asse, heapes vpon heapes, with the iaw of an asse haue I slaine a thousand men.
     17 And it came to passe when he had made an end of speaking, that hee cast away the iaw bone out of his hand, and called that place Ramath-Lehi.

2. (countable) Any of the bones in the lower or upper jaw.
3. (countable, singular or plural, music) A shaken musical instrument (an idiophone) made from the jawbone of an animal and shaken such that the teeth vibrate in their sockets to produce sound.
4. (uncountable, slang, archaic) Credit.
   • 1862 October 21, Times Correspondent:

     We have a few persons whose pockets are to let—men who have more complaints than dollars—individuals who, in digger's parlance, live on jawbone (credit), and are always to be found at saloons; a class of men who, when they are here, wish themselves yonder, and when yonder, wish themselves back.

• (the bone of the lower jaw): inferior maxillary bone, lower jaw, mandible, submaxilla
• (any bone in the lower or upper jaw): dentary, dentary bone, maxilla

• jawboneist

jawbone (third-person singular simple present jawbones, present participle jawboning, simple past and past participle jawboned)

1. To talk persistently in an attempt to persuade somebody to cooperate.

• jawboning