Mutilate \Mu"ti*late\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Mutilated; p. pr. &
vb. n. Mutilating.]
1. To cut off or remove a limb or essential part of; to maim;
to cripple; to hack; as, to mutilate the body, a statue,
etc.
2. To destroy or remove a material part of, so as to render
imperfect; as, to mutilate the orations of Cicero.
Among the mutilated poets of antiquity, there is
none whose fragments are so beautiful as those of
Sappho. --Addison.
Mutilated gear, Mutilated wheel (Mach.), a gear wheel
from a portion of whose periphery the cogs are omitted. It
is used for giving intermittent movements.
Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
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