heel

Etymology

From Middle English hele, from Old English hēla, from Proto-West Germanic *hą̄hil, from Proto-Germanic *hanhilaz, diminutive of Proto-Germanic *hanhaz (“heel”), equivalent to hock + -le. More at hock. Compare North Frisian haehl, Dutch hiel, Danish and Norwegian hæl, Swedish häl.

noun

1. (anatomy) The rear part of the foot, where it joins the leg.
   He [the stag] calls to mind his strength and then his speed, / His winged heels and then his armed head. 1709, John Denham, Coopers-Hill
2. The part of a shoe's sole which supports the foot's heel.
3. The rear part of a sock or similar covering for the foot.
4. The part of the palm of a hand closest to the wrist.
   He drove the heel of his hand into the man's nose.
5. (usually in the plural) A woman's high-heeled shoe.
   She'd been wearing heels, and fell backward off her right heel and twisted or broke her ankle. 2008, Kwame Shauku, Wonderful Williams and the Magnificent Seven, page 257
   Opting to improve her odds of making it up the stairs and into the privacy of her room, she kicked off her left heel, and then her right before leaning down to scoop them up. 2011, Candace Irvine, A Dangerous Engagement
   Flat shoes. As she pushed off her left heel and pressed the sole of her foot to the cold floor she looked forward to them. 2015, Alex Blackmore, Killing Eva
6. (firearms) The back, upper part of the stock.
7. (music) The thickening of the neck of a stringed instrument where it attaches to the body.
8. The last or lowest part of anything.
   the heel of a mast
   the heel of a vessel
   And then again the sportsmen would move at an undertaker's pace, when the fox had traversed and the hounds would be at a loss to know which was the hunt and which was the heel 1860, Anthony Trollope, Framley Parsonage
9. (US, Ireland, Scotland, Australia) A crust end-piece of a loaf of bread.
   Boiled mutton was in one, and the heel of a damper in another. 1902, Barbara Baynton, edited by Sally Krimmer and Alan Lawson, Bush Studies (Portable Australian Authors: Barbara Baynton), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, published 1980, page 32
10. (US) The base of a bun sliced in half lengthwise.
    The bottom half, or the bun heel is placed in the carton, and the pickle slices spread evenly over the meat or cheese. 1996, Ester Reiter, Making Fast Food: From the Frying Pan Into the Fryer, page 100
11. (informal) A contemptible, unscrupulous, inconsiderate or thoughtless person.
    I grinned at him sneeringly. I was the heel to end all heels. Wait until the man is down, then kick him and kick him again. He's weak. He can't resist or kick back. 1953, Raymond Chandler, chapter 29, in The Long Goodbye
    Douglas steams and stammers, a typical film noir heel, while Stone delivers her dialogue with the devilish gleam of a sly actor having a great time. 2022-03-20, Jason Bailey, “‘Basic Instinct’ at 30: A Time Capsule That Can Still Offend”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
12. (slang, professional wrestling) A headlining wrestler regarded as a "bad guy," whose ring persona embodies villainous or reprehensible traits and demonstrates characteristics of a braggart and a bully.
    Freedman began his analysis by noting two important facts about professional wrestling: First, that heels triumph considerably more often than do babyfaces[…] 1992, Bruce Lincoln, Discourse and the Construction of Society, page 158
13. (card games) The cards set aside for later use in a patience or solitaire game.
14. Anything resembling a human heel in shape; a protuberance; a knob.
15. (architecture) The lower end of a timber in a frame, as a post or rafter.
16. (specifically, US) The obtuse angle of the lower end of a rafter set sloping.
17. (architecture, obsolete) A cyma reversa.
    Of these there are two Kinds; in the one, that Part which has the greatest Projecture is Concave, and is term'd Doucine, or an Upright Ogee; in the other, the Convex Part has the greatest Projecture; and this is call'd the Heel, or Inverted Ogee. 1722, Claude Perrault, A Treatise of the Five Orders in Architecture, page vii
    There are two kinds—the upright ogee, in which the concave part projects most, and the heel or inverted ogee, which has the convexity most prominent. This last, with its fillet above, is always the upper moulding of a classical cornice. 1846, George William Francis, The Dictionary of the Arts, Sciences, and Manufactures
    Talon: Heel moulding or ogee 1891, Vignola, Practical Elementary Treatise on Architecture, page ii
18. (carpentry) The short side of an angled cut.
19. (golf) The part of a club head's face nearest the shaft.
20. The lower end of the bit (cutting edge) of an axehead; as opposed to the toe (upper end).
21. In a carding machine, the part of a flat nearest the cylinder.
22. (nautical) The junction between the keel and the stempost of a vessel; an angular wooden join connecting the two.