Definition of "shaft"

shaft

/ʃɑːft/

noun
plural shafts
1. (obsolete) The entire body of a long weapon, such as an arrow.
  Quotations
  His sleep, his meat, his drink, is him bereft, / That lean he wax, and dry as is a shaft.
  c. 1343-1400, Geoffrey Chaucer
  A shaft hath three principal parts, the stele, the feathers, and the head.
  c. 1515-1568, Roger Ascham
2. The long, narrow, central body of a spear, arrow, or javelin.
  Quotations
  Orion hit a rabbit once; but though sore wounded it got to the bury, and, struggling in, the arrow caught the side of the hole and was drawn out. […]. Ikey the blacksmith had forged us a spearhead after a sketch from a picture of a Greek warrior; and a rake-handle served as a shaft.
  1879, R[ichard] J[efferies], chapter II, in The Amateur Poacher, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […]
3. (by extension) Anything cast or thrown as a spear or javelin.
  Quotations
  And the thunder, / Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage, / Perhaps hath spent his shafts.
  c. 1608-1674, John Milton
  Some kinds of literary pursuits […] have been attacked with all the shafts of ridicule.
  c. 1752-1821, Vicesimus Knox
4. Any long thin object, such as the handle of a tool, one of the poles between which an animal is harnessed to a vehicle, the driveshaft of a motorized vehicle with rear-wheel drive, an axle, etc.
  Quotations
  While Kitto chatted to William, Jessamy looked with interest at the dog cart. It had a pair of high wooden wheels with two seats back to back above. Between the shafts the bay mare tossed her head and fidgeted on the cobbles.
  1967, Barbara Sleigh, Jessamy, Sevenoaks, Kent: Bloomsbury, published 1993, page 57
  Turbines have been around for a long time—windmills and water wheels are early examples. The name comes from the Latin turbo, meaning vortex, and thus the defining property of a turbine is that a fluid or gas turns the blades of a rotor, which is attached to a shaft that can perform useful work.
  2013 July-August, Lee S. Langston, “The Adaptable Gas Turbine”, in American Scientist
5. A beam or ray of light.
  Quotations
  They were a fine company of old women, and a Dutch painter would have loved to find them there together, where the sun made bright patches on the floor and sent long, quivering shafts of gold through the dusky shade up among the rafters.
  1912, Willa Cather, The Bohemian Girl:
6. The main axis of a feather.
7. (lacrosse) The long narrow body of a lacrosse stick.
8. A vertical or inclined passage sunk into the earth as part of a mine
9. A vertical passage housing a lift or elevator; a liftshaft.
10. A ventilation or heating conduit; an air duct.
11. (architecture) Any column or pillar, particularly the body of a column between its capital and pedestal.
  Quotations
  Bid time and nature gently spare / The shaft we raise to thee.
  c. 1803-1882, Ralph Waldo Emerson
12. The main cylindrical part of the penis.
13. The chamber of a blast furnace.
14. (meteorology) A relatively small area of precipitation that an onlook can discern from the dry surrounding area.
verb
third-person singular simple present shafts, present participle shafting, simple past and past participle shafted
1. (transitive, slang) To fuck over; to cause harm to, especially through deceit or treachery.
  Quotations
  Who can I trust after repeatedly being shafted
  1992, “Crackers And Cheese”, performed by Eminem
2. (transitive) To equip with a shaft.
3. (transitive, slang) To fuck; to have sexual intercourse with.
  Quotations
  Which grotesque auld hing-oot will the shrivelled post-menopausal slag want tae shaft? Stay tuned.
  1994 , Irvine Welsh, Trainspotting, London: Minerva, page 252
  Well at least I can get it up. No wonder Mary's going out of her head. Stuck with you sponging off her and not even a decent shafting for her trouble.
  2018 Christian Cooke as Mickey Argyle, "Episode 2", Ordeal by Innocence (written by Sarah Phelps) 23 minutes