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A head or poll tax; hence, extortion. [Obs.] Foxe.

One who polls or cuts hair; a barber. [R.] (c) One who extorts or plunders. [Obs.] Bacon. (d) One who registers voters, or one who enters his name as a voter.

Plunder, or extortion. [Obs.] E. Hall.

y stretched until, sometimes, the joints were dislocated; -- formerly used judicially for extorting confessions from criminals or suspected persons. During the troubles of the fifteenth century, a rack was introduced into the Tower, and was occasionally used under the plea of political necessity. Macaulay.…

Avaricious; grasping; extortionate; also, greedy; ravenous; voracious; as, rapacious usurers; a rapacious appetite. [Thy Lord] redeem thee from Death's rapacious claim Milton .

The act or practice of extorting or exacting by oppressive injustice; exorbitant greediness of gain. "The rapacity of some ages." Sprat.

Eagerness for plunder; rapacity; extortion. Luke xi. 39.

An extortioner; a sharp bargainer; a skinflint; a niggard. Thackeray.

emoving the beard; to cut closely; hence, to be hard and severe in a bargain; to practice extortion; to cheat.

efore being taken to jail, or until they compromise with their creditors. At these houses extortionate charges are commonly made for food, lodging, etc.

The extortion of money, or the attempt to extort money, by threat of injury; blackmailing. Strike block (Carp.), a plane shorter than a jointer, used for fitting a short joint. Moxon. -- Strike of flax, a handful that may be hackled at once. [Obs. or Prov. Eng.] Chaucer. -- Strike of sugar. (Sugar Making) (a) The act…

adv. Threatening letters (Law), letters containing threats, especially those designed to extort money, or to obtain other property, by menaces; blackmailing letters.

severe pain inflicted judicially, either as punishment for a crime, or for the purpose of extorting a confession from an accused person, as by water or fire, by the boot or thumbkin, or by the rack or wheel.

Fig.: One who lives by preying on others; an extortioner; a bloodsucker.

Fig.: The practice of extortion. Carlyle.

To turn; to twist; esp., to twist or extort by violence; to pull of force away by, or as if by, violent wringing or twisting. "The secret wrested from me." Milton. Our country's cause, That drew our swords, now secret wrests them from our hand. Addison. They instantly wrested the government out of the hands of Hastings…

To extract or obtain by twisting and compressing; to squeeze or press (out); hence, to extort; to draw forth by violence, or against resistance or repugnance; -- usually with out or form. Your overkindness doth wring tears from me. Shak. He rose up early on the morrow, and thrust the fleece together, and wringed the de…

One who, or that which, wrings; hence, an extortioner.

To extort; to wring; to wrest. [R.] The nobility hesitated not to follow the example of their sovereign in writhing money from them by every species of oppression. Sir W. Scott.