tomahawk

Etymology

From an Eastern Algonquian word, most likely Powhatan tumahák; compare also Malecite-Passamaquoddy tomhikon (“ax”), Abenaki temahigan, demahigan (“ax”).

noun

1. An ax used by Native American warriors.
   yeerely bring into our store house, at the beginning of their haruest two bushels of corne a man […] for which they should receiue so many Iron Tomahawkes or small hatchets. 1615, Ralph Hamor, A True Discourse of the Present State of Virginia (published in Richmond in 1957), page 13
2. (basketball) A dunk performed with one's arm behind one's head.
3. (geometry) A geometric construction consisting of a semicircle and two line segments that serves as a tool for trisecting an angle; so called from its resemblance to the American Indian axe.
4. (field hockey) A field hockey shot style that involves a player turning their hockey stick upside-down and swinging it so that its inside edge will come into contact with the ball.

verb

1. To strike or cut up with a tomahawk.
   In a moment the savage wretches dashed at him, and "tomahawked" the unfortunate man, who fell backwards into his cabin. 1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 296
   Not satisfied with tomahawking our colleagues in the country, they ask the scanty remnant in the House to join in the scalp dance. 1906, FE Smith, maiden speech to House of Commons, 12 Mar 1906
2. (historical) To girdle or incise the trees around (an area of land) so as to claim ownership of it.
   He was the owner of 1,300 acres of land bought from the government and located where the city of Lexington, Ky., now stands. After his marriage he tomahawked an area of 600 acres near Carmichaelstown, […] 1909, Samuel Gordon Smyth, A Genealogy of the Duke-Shepherd-Van Metre Family: From Civil, Military, Church and Family Records and Documents, page 67
   Meantime, Silas Zane passed on and came to the forks, and admiring the locality, he tomahawked his right to it, securing one thousand acres. 1915, Chronicles of the Cochrans: Being a Series of Historical Events and Narratives, in which Members of this Family Have Played a Prominent Part, page 55
   The Germans thought that by just tomahawking a claim and living on it, it was an "improvement" and that was sufficient for claim; but not so with the Land Office. The land had to be legally registered and taxes paid on it […] 1993, H. Austin Cooper, Two Centuries of Brothersvalley Church of the Brethren, 1762-1962: An Account of the Old Colonial Church, the Stony Creek German Baptist Church and the Area of Bruedersthal in which the Brethren Settled in the Summer of 1762, and Organized by Elder George Adam Martin, Presiding Elder
   They tomahawked the land they settled on and were joined by other settlers. Each settler picked out the piece of land that he or, in some instances, she desired which resulted in oddly shaped plats when they were later surveyed. 2011, Don Corbly, Pastor John Corbly and his neighbors in Greene Township, Lulu.com, page 23
3. (basketball) To perform a tomahawk dunk.
   When the league held its first slam-dunk contest in 1984 in Denver, Nance, then a Phoenix Sun, soared into the rafters with a basketball in each hand and tomahawked each one through the net before floating back to earth […] 2007, Bob Dyer, The Top 20 Moments in Cleveland Sports, page 237