American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth
Edition - n. A person or animal that is partially disabled or
unable to use a limb or limbs: cannot race a horse that is a
cripple. - n. A damaged or defective object or device. - v. To
cause to lose the use of a limb or limbs. - v. To disable,
damage, or impair the functioning of: a strike that crippled the
factory. Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia - n. One who creeps,
halts, or limps; one who is partially or wholly deprived of the
use of one or more of his limbs; a lame person: also applied to
animals. - n. A dense thicket in swampy or low land; a patch of
low timber-growth. - n. A rocky shallow in a stream: so called
by lumbermen. - Lame; decrepit. - To walk haltingly, like a
cripple. - To make (one) a cripple; partly disable by injuring a
limb or limbs; deprive of the free use of a limb or limbs,
especially of a leg or foot; lame. - To disable in part; impair
the power or efficiency of; weaken by impairment: as, the fleet
was crippled in the e