rosehead

From rose +‎ head.

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rosehead (plural roseheads)

1. The head or blossom of a rose.
   • 1986, Elizabeth Cadell, The Empty Nest:

     He's here, I've heard, day after day, following you round while you snip off roseheads.

   • 1994, Stephanie Donaldson, Dried Flower Gifts: Creating Decorative Arrangements, page 44:

     The achillea and Craspedia have strong stems which can simply be pushed into the foam ball, but as the roseheads, dahlias and Helichrysum have no stems, it is best to use a glue gun to fix the flowers to the foam ball.

   • 2023, Michelle Cox, A Haunting at Linley:

     She plucked a rosehead and anxiously began pulling off the petals as she listlessly wandered, remembering Antonia's words that perhaps the boys were better off at Phillips.

2. A many-sided pyramidal head upon a nail.
   • 1993, Samuel D. Smith, Fort Southwest Point Archaeological Site, Kingston,, page 241:

     In the Fort Southwest Point collection, hand-wrought iron nails headed in the "rosehead" pattern account for a total of 3,549 specimens (38% of hand-wrought nails).

   • 2000, Thomas Durant Visser, Field Guide to New England Barns and Farm Buildings, page 24:

     The most common shape was the "rosehead"; however, broad "butterfly" heads and narrow L-heads also were crafted.

   • 2023, Neville A. Ritchie, Archaeology and History of the Chinese in Southern New Zealand During the Nineteenth Century, page 165:

     Nails with distinctive "roseheads" (Figure 5.65a) are the most common type of nail found in the study sites.

3. A nail with that kind of head.
   • 1985, ‎Morrison H. Heckscher, ‎Mary-Alice Rogers, American Furniture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, page 115:

     The gadroon strips have been reset, their roseheads countersunk.

   • 2009, Sharon Fiffer, Killer Stuff:

     It's the nails. There are some hand-forged roseheads in there.

   • 2015, Leon Uris, Trinity, page 290:

     "These are roseheads in this bin," he said, "and these are tenderhooks and horseshoe nails here, and scuppers."

4. A circular or spherical nozzle or end to something that is perforated to allow the escape of liquid or gas.
   • 1860, Thos. Greaves, “Memoirs of a Veterinary Surgeon: Thoughts in the Sick Box”, in Veterinarian, volume 33, page 202:

     To this I attach a rosehead like that of an ordinary deggin-can, and have it placed, pointing upwards, directly underneath and near to my patient's nostrils.

   • 1902, Chas. W. Behm, “Formaldehyde Disinfection”, in Legislative Documents Submitted to the Twenty-ninth General Assembly of the State of Iowa, page 259:

     At first a bottle was used to which an ordinary watering pot rosehead was attached, and the solution thrown on the suspended sheets, but this was soon modified and changes made until a suitable apparatus was devised for disinfection purposes and a new system of room disinfections was introduced.

   • 1908, W. A. Neracher, “Automatic Fire Protection”, in Proceedings of the Engineers' Society of Western Pennsylvania, page 328:

     Early forms of sprinklers were in the shape of roseheads or hollow, perforated , spherical-shaped bodies, but experience soon proved that such small openings would be stopped up by dust , or by the sediment or scale from within the pipes.

   • 1911, Institution of Post Office Electrical Engineers, London, Papers - Issues 47-67, page 19:

     In mixing, water should be applied through a rosehead, as the moisture is thereby more evenly distributed, and there is less risk of washing away the cement.

   • 2010, J. B. Yadav, Advanced Practical Physical Chemisty, page 46:

     The bubbling of vapour through the rosehead should not be too brisk, otherwise solution will be lost through the hole, G.

5. (dentistry, surgery) A bur or gouge that has a spherical head and curled blades, resembling the curled petals of a rose.
   • 1864, Timothy Holmes, A System of Surgery, page 1044:

     The rosehead is a most effective gouge for removing carious bone, as well as a very convenient instrument for enlarging cloacae to allow of an exploration for sequestra.

   • 2017, Nicola Rogers, ‎Cinzia Pickett, Basic Guide to Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, page 50:

     The rosehead bur is used to remove bone and the flat fissured bur to bisect a tooth for easier removal.

   • 2020, Nishant Raj Chourasia,Vastani Ankita,Vajpayee Samarth, Coronectomy for Mandibular Third Molars, page 45:

     A long shank micromotor carbide rosehead no. 6 bur is the most appropriate bur used to perform coronectomy mounted on a contra angle micromotor hand piece as it facilitates inducing the cut in the third molar better as compared to the straight bone cutting handpiece due to inaccessibility of the area in which procedure is being performed.

6. (woodworking) A conical drillbit that has radiating blades.
   • 1984, P. F. Lye, Woodwork Theory, page 67:

     The rosehead bit has a series of cutters, nine in all, that radiate from the centre point.

   • 2006, Frank Saxon, Tolley's Basic Science and Practice of Gas Service, page 438:

     Usually included is a rose bit (Fig. 13.20) or the rosehead countersink (Fig. 13.21).

   • 2007, Percy Blandford, The Woodworker's Bible: A Complete Guide to Woodworking:

     A rosehead bit will also countersink brass, if it is necessary to deal with screw holes in hinges or other metal fittings; but there are flat countersinking bits for metal that are made to fit braces.

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