saddle bow

• saddle-bow, saddlebow

From Middle English sadel-bowe, sadel-boȝe, from Old English sadulboga, sadolboga, equivalent to saddle +‎ bow.

saddle bow (plural saddle bows)

1. The front part of the saddle that is arched up like a bow.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, IV.8:

     the Prince […] stroke the Pagan with his steely brand / So sore, that to his saddle-bow thereby / He bowed low, and so a while did lie […].

   • 1931, ‘Sand in the Streets’, Time, 12 Oct 1931:

     The Government mobilized the full force of 18,000 mounted gendarmes and sent them picking their way over the sand about as heavily armored as any policeman could be: a long lance in one hand, a sabre at the saddle bow, a rifle across the back, a pistol on the hip.