clearance vs snag

clearance

noun
  • The first disposal in a chain that leaves the area of a stoppage, or a disposal that leaves the area of a stoppage itself. 

  • The act of clearing or something (such as a space) cleared. 

  • A permission for a vehicle to proceed, or for a person to travel. 

  • A permission to have access to sensitive or secret documents or other information. 

  • The act of kicking a ball away from the goal one is defending. 

  • The act of potting all the remaining balls on a table at one visit. 

  • Clear or net profit. 

  • The settlement of transactions involving securities or means of payment such as checks by means of a clearing house. 

  • A permission to use something, usually intellectual property, that is legally, but not otherwise, protected. 

  • The height or width of a tunnel, bridge or other passage, or the distance between a vehicle and the walls or roof of such passage; a gap, headroom. 

  • The distance between two moving objects, especially between parts of a machine 

  • A sale of merchandise, especially at significantly reduced prices, usually in order to make room for new merchandise or updated versions of the same merchandise. 

  • The removal of harmful substances from the blood; renal clearance. 

  • Removal of pieces from a rank, file or diagonal so that a bishop, rook or queen is free to move along it. 

  • The act of leaving the area of a stoppage. 

snag

verb
  • To obtain or pick up. 

  • To damage or sink (a vessel) by collision; said of a tree or branch fixed to the bottom of a navigable body of water and partially submerged or rising to just beneath the surface. 

  • To cut the snags or branches from, as the stem of a tree; to hew roughly. 

  • To fish by means of dragging a large hook or hooks on a line, intending to impale the body (rather than the mouth) of the target. 

  • To catch or tear (e.g. fabric) upon a rough surface or projection. 

noun
  • A stump or base of a branch that has been lopped off; a short branch, or a sharp or rough branch. 

  • A sausage. 

  • A tooth projecting beyond the others; a broken or decayed tooth. 

  • A goal. 

  • A misnaged, an opponent to Chassidic Judaism (more likely modern, for cultural reasons). 

  • A problem or difficulty with something. 

  • A dead tree that remains standing. 

  • A tree, or a branch of a tree, fixed in the bottom of a river or other navigable water, and rising nearly or quite to the surface, by which boats are sometimes pierced and sunk. 

  • Any sharp protuberant part of an object, which may catch, scratch, or tear other objects brought into contact with it. 

  • A pulled thread or yarn, as in cloth. 

  • One of the secondary branches of an antler. 

How often have the words clearance and snag occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )