different between shorttail vs shirttail

English

short +? tail

shorttail (not comparable)

shirt +? tail

shirttail (plural shirttails)

The single or split (then rather plural) bottom part of a shirt, below the waist, especially in the back, which, when not tucked into trousers or other vestment, hangs over the wearer's tail-end, like a tail.
(by extension) The tail-end or periphery of something.
A tenuous connection.
A distant kinship.
A small portion
Something small and unimportant.

Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, G.&C. Merriam Co., 1967

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