cudgel : Idioms & Phrases
Cudgel play
- a fight or sportive contest with cudgels.
Webster 1913
To cross the cudgels
- to forbear or give up the contest; a phrase borrowed from the practice of cudgel players, who lay one cudgel over another when the contest is ended.
Webster 1913
To cudgel one's brains
- to exercise one's wits.
Webster 1913
To take up cudgels for
- to engage in a contest in behalf of (some one or something).