snare

Etymology

From Middle English snare, from Old English snearu, sneare (“a string; cord”), from Proto-Germanic *snarhǭ (“a sling; loop; noose”). Cognate with Old Norse snara. Also related to German Schnur and Dutch snaar, snoer.

noun

1. A trap (especially one made from a loop of wire, string, or leather).
   He […] watched Beavis’s long-toothed mouth open and clap to like a rabbit snare. 1943, Graham Greene, The Ministry of Fear, London: Heinemann, published 1960, Book Three, Chapter One, pp. 196-197
   He felt a snare tightening around his throat; he gasped and threw a leg out of the bed, where it jerked for a second or two, thumping the steel frame, and died. 2013, Richard Flanagan, chapter 18, in The Narrow Road to the Deep North, New York: Knopf, published 2014, page 332
2. A mental or psychological trap.
   They were devious war aims, and Allenby’s campaign was fought with a maximum of snare and subterfuge. 1978, Jan Morris, Farewell the Trumpets: An Imperial Retreat, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Part One, Chapter 9, p. 173
3. (veterinary) A loop of cord used in obstetric cases, to hold or to pull a fetus from the mother animal.
4. (surgery) A similar looped instrument formerly used to remove tumours etc.
5. (music) A set of stiff wires held under tension against the lower skin of a drum to create a rattling sound.
6. (music) A snare drum.

verb

1. (transitive) To catch or hold, especially with a loop.
2. (transitive, figurative) To ensnare.