Note: This is the more general word. See {Brace},
{Cantalever}, {Console}, {Corbel}, {Strut}.
2. (Engin. & Mech.) A piece or combination of pieces, usually
triangular in general shape, projecting from, or fastened
to, a wall, or other surface, to support heavy bodies or
to strengthen angles.
3. (Naut.) A shot, crooked timber, resembling a knee, used as
a support.
4. (Mil.) The cheek or side of an ordnance carriage.
5. (Print.) One of two characters [], used to inclose a
reference, explanation, or note, or a part to be excluded
from a sentence, to indicate an interpolation, to rectify
a mistake, or to supply an omission, and for certain other
purposes; -- called also {crotchet}.
6. A gas fixture or lamp holder projecting from the face of a
wall, column, or the like.
{Bracket light}, a gas fixture or a lamp attached to a wall,
column, etc.
The crotchets of their cot in columns rise.
--Dryden.
2. (Mus.) A time note, with a stem, having one fourth the
value of a semibreve, one half that of a minim, and twice
that of a quaver; a quarter note.
3. (Fort.) An indentation in the glacis of the covered way,
at a point where a traverse is placed.
4. (Mil.) The arrangement of a body of troops, either forward
or rearward, so as to form a line nearly perpendicular to
the general line of battle.
5. (Print.) A bracket. See {Bracket}.
6. (Med.) An instrument of a hooked form, used in certain
cases in the extraction of a fetus. --Dunglison.
7. A perverse fancy; a whim which takes possession of the
mind; a conceit.
He ruined himself and all that trusted in him by
crotchets that he could never explain to any
rational man. --De Quincey.