stern vs tailpiece

stern

noun
  • The rear part or after end of a ship or vessel. 

  • A bird, the black tern. 

  • The tail of an animal; now used only of the tail of a dog. 

  • The hinder part of anything. 

  • The post of management or direction. 

adj
  • Grim and forbidding in appearance. 

  • Having a hardness and severity of nature or manner. 

verb
  • To propel or move backward or stern-first in the water. 

tailpiece

noun
  • An element, often triangular, to which the strings of a violin, guitar, etc. are attached at the lower end of an instrument. 

  • An appendage or appendix. 

  • A short joist between a header and a wall. 

  • The part of a telescope containing the adjusting device for the eyepiece, etc. 

  • The part of a lock that transmits motion from the hub to the latch bolt. 

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