spread-eagle

From spread eagle (noun).

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spread-eagle (comparative more spread-eagle, superlative most spread-eagle)

1. Lying with arms and legs outstretched and separated.
2. (Can we verify⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) (dated, US) Characterized by a pretentious, boastful, exaggerated style; bombastic.
   • c. 1857, unknown author, from Boston Gazette, quoted in in George Francis Train, Spread-eagleism, page 88 (1859)

     Our former townsman, Mr. G. F. Train, has recently made a tremendous spread-eagle speech in England, upon the occasion of the reopening of trade between Liverpool and New Zealand […]

   • 1894, The Arena, volume 10, page 581:

     But Mr. Lloyd is not a spread-eagle patriot, or much given to political partisanship.

   • 1900, The Nation, volume 70, page 101:

     The firm did a large and lucrative business from the start, the orders from spread-eagle orators often taxing the full capacity of its works.

• spreadeagleism

spread-eagle (third-person singular simple present spread-eagles, present participle spread-eagling, simple past and past participle spread-eagled)

1. (transitive) To put into a spread-eagle position, with arms and legs extended and spread.
2. (intransitive) To put one's body in a spread eagle.

• “spread-eagle”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.