Other forms: pinions, pinioned
To pinion is to bind somebody's arms so they cannot move. Pinion his arms, pinioned to the chair, arms pinioned behind him.
It means restraining the arms specifically rather than tying generally. The noun is the outer part of a bird's wing, and pinioning a bird means cutting it so the bird cannot fly. In machinery, a pinion is the small gear in a rack and pinion. Note that the Latin penna means a feather.
1verbpinionTo bind somebody's arms so they cannot move.
“Two guards pinioned his arms behind his back and led him away.”
2nounsmallThe small gear in a rack and pinion.
“Turning the steering wheel moves a small pinion along a toothed rack.”
pinion is a binding, or a gear.
PINion → your arms PINned to your sides
They pin both arms flat against your sides so you cannot move them at all.
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Old French pignon comes from Latin penna, a feather or wing. Pen and pinnacle come from the same feather.
Proto-Indo-European
*peth₂-
Latin
penna — feather
Old French
pignon
Middle English
pynyon
English, today
pinion
From Middle English pynyon, from Old French pignon, from Latin penna (“feather”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA