Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English homepage

Topic: AGRICULTURE

Language: Old English
Origin: scieran

shear

 verb
     
shear past tense sheared, past participle sheared or shorn [transitive]
1TA to cut the wool off a sheep
2 literary to cut off someone's hair:
Her long fair hair had been shorn.

be shorn of something

phrasal verb
to have something valuable or important taken away from you:
Though shorn of some of its powers, the party remains in control.

shear off

phrasal verb
if part of something shears off, or is sheared off, it suddenly becomes separated, especially after being pulled or hit with a lot of force
shear something ↔ off
The left wing had been almost completely sheared off.
Definition of shear from the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English within
the topic AGRICULTURE
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