v. [f. TIGHT a. + -EN5.]
1. trans. To draw tight or tighter; to make taut or tense, to draw close; hence, to fix tightly, to make strict or rigid; to secure. Also fig.
1727. Bailey, vol. II., To Tighten, to make straight, as a Line, Cord, etc., also to dress after a tight Manner.
1755. Johnson, To Tighten, to straiten, make close.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist., VII. 251. The spider only wants to have one end of the line fast, in order to secure and tighten the other.
1810. Scott, Lady of L., I. vi. What reins were tightened in despair.
1846. Brittan, trans. Malgaigne’s Man. Oper. Surg. 39. The stitches should not be tightened until all the threads are in; and the rule is, that those of the middle, or angles, should be first tightened.
1859. Handbk. Turning, 59. If it cuts too deep, tighten the screws a little more.
1896. Lady A. Kerr, Life Seb. Valfré, 232. We find him … revising and tightening up the rules of a community.
b. To press closely together; to pack; to compress. Also fig.
1845. Fairbairn, Typol. Script. (1657), I. I. ii. 49. A type so tightened and compressed as to admit of nothing but what pertained to the tabernacle worship.
1853. Kane, Grinnell Exp., xvi. (1856), 123. A gradually increasing breeze from the E.S.E. … had tightened the floes.
c. absol. = TIGHT-LACE v. colloq.
1896. Daily News, 29 Oct., 9/5. A fellow servant … used to ask why ‘she didn’t tighten a little more.’
2. intr. To grow tight or tense; to be stretched tight or drawn close. Also fig.
1846. Landor, Imag. Conv., Emp. China & Tsing-Ti, Wks. 1853, II. 118/1. My skin seemed too small for them, it tightened so.
1868. Rogers, Pol. Econ., xi. (1876), 150. As the market tightens … the rate of discount rises.
1871. L. Stephen, Playgr. Eur., vii. (1894), 158. The rope once or twice tightened unpleasantly.
1897. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., II. 788. The radial artery is felt to tighten day by day.
† 3. refl. To make oneself ‘tight’ or tidy; cf. TIGHT a. 4. Obs. rare.
1786. Mrs. A. M. Bennett, Juvenile Indiscr., II. 113. Her daughter was run up to tighten herself, fit, as she said, to walk with them.
Hence Tightening vbl. sb. and ppl. a.
1846. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 34. Placing the tightening roller in the position represented by the dotted lines. Ibid., 806. Two of the bracing chains, with their tightening shackle.
1836. W. Irving, Astoria, I. 139. The tightening of the padding and the pressing of the head to the board is gradual.
1877. Knight, Dict. Mech., Tightening pulley, one which rests against the band in order to tighten it.
1902. Words Eyewitness, 135. Men … who would have met untold sorrow with but a tightening of the lips.
