Definition of "heel"

He [the stag] calls to mind his strength and then his speed, / His winged heels and then his armed head.

1709, John Denham, Coopers-Hill

She'd been wearing heels, and fell backward off her right heel and twisted or broke her ankle.

2008, Kwame Shauku, Wonderful Williams and the Magnificent Seven, page 257

Opting to improve her odds of making it up the stairs and into the privacy of her room, she kicked off her left heel, and then her right before leaning down to scoop them up.

2011, Candace Irvine, A Dangerous Engagement

Flat shoes. As she pushed off her left heel and pressed the sole of her foot to the cold floor she looked forward to them.

2015, Alex Blackmore, Killing Eva

And then again the sportsmen would move at an undertaker's pace, when the fox had traversed and the hounds would be at a loss to know which was the hunt and which was the heel

1860, Anthony Trollope, Framley Parsonage

the heel of the white loaf

1814 July 7, [Walter Scott], Waverley; […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown

Boiled mutton was in one, and the heel of a damper in another.

1902, Barbara Baynton, edited by Sally Krimmer and Alan Lawson, Bush Studies (Portable Australian Authors: Barbara Baynton), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, published 1980, page 32

`Have ye seen,' said Uncle Jobson with basilisk severity, `what's become of the heel of to-day's loaf?'

1930, Norman Lindsay, Redheap, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1965, page 42

The bottom half, or the bun heel is placed in the carton, and the pickle slices spread evenly over the meat or cheese.

1996, Ester Reiter, Making Fast Food: From the Frying Pan Into the Fryer, page 100

I grinned at him sneeringly. I was the heel to end all heels. Wait until the man is down, then kick him and kick him again. He's weak. He can't resist or kick back.

1953, Raymond Chandler, chapter 29, in The Long Goodbye

Douglas steams and stammers, a typical film noir heel, while Stone delivers her dialogue with the devilish gleam of a sly actor having a great time.

2022 March 20, Jason Bailey, “‘Basic Instinct’ at 30: A Time Capsule That Can Still Offend”, in The New York Times‎

Freedman began his analysis by noting two important facts about professional wrestling: First, that heels triumph considerably more often than do babyfaces […]

1992, Bruce Lincoln, Discourse and the Construction of Society, page 158

Of these there are two Kinds; in the one, that Part which has the greatest Projecture is Concave, and is term'd Doucine, or an Upright Ogee; in the other, the Convex Part has the greatest Projecture; and this is call'd the Heel, or Inverted Ogee.

1722, Claude Perrault, A Treatise of the Five Orders in Architecture, page vii

There are two kinds—the upright ogee, in which the concave part projects most, and the heel or inverted ogee, which has the convexity most prominent. This last, with its fillet above, is always the upper moulding of a classical cornice.

1846, George William Francis, The Dictionary of the Arts, Sciences, and Manufactures

Talon: Heel moulding or ogee

1891, Vignola, Practical Elementary Treatise on Architecture, page ii

I cannot sing, Nor heel the high lavolt.

c. 1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act IV, scene iv], lines 85-86

The faster a ship sails, the better she will answer her helm; if she sail very slow, she will scarce steer at all. If she heel much, she won't answer the helm so well.

1764, John Nourse, Navigation Or, the Art of Sailing Upon the Sea, page 65

[T]he boat, from a sudden gust of wind, taking a deep heel, I tumbled overboard and down I went […] .

1808–10, William Hickey, Memoirs of a Georgian Rake, Folio Society 1995, p. 14

They should be dug up with a sharp mattock or grub hoe, the roots being broken as little as possible, and they should be heeled in a cool place and protected from the sun until ready to plant. When lifted for planting from the trench in which heeled the roots should be kept covered with a wet sack.

1911, Biennial Report of the State Geologist, North Carolina Geological Survey Section, page 92

In the late fall the seedlings may be dug and heeled in very closely until all the leaves have dropped.

1913, Indian School Journal, page 142

Member: Did you water the trees when you set them out?Walter Vonnegut: No; I heeled the trees in as soon as they were received.

1916, Transactions of the Indiana Horticultural Society, page 111

If trees are received from the nursery in the fall, they should be carefully heeled in until the planting season opens in the spring.

1937, Robert Wilson, Ernest John George, Planting and care of shelterbelts on the northern Great Plains, page 15

Place seedlings in the trench. Small-stemmed seedlings may be heeled-in in bunches of 25, but large seedlings should be heeled-in loose.

1976, Keith W. Dorman, The Genetics and Breeding of Southern Pines, page 66

[I] of my own free will and accord, do hereby, here at and hereon, solemnly swear that I will always heel, conceal and never improperly reveal any of the secrets or mysteries of, or belonging to [the Masons].

, Brian Kerr, Lodge St Lawrence 144 Ritual, page 34