clive
/ˈklaɪv/
clive verb: to climb; ascend.
Verb (1)
clive (third-person singular simple present clives, present participle cliving, simple past clived or clove, past participle clived or clove or cliven)
Noun
clive (plural clives)
Verb (2)
clive (third-person singular simple present clives, present participle cliving, simple past and past participle clived)
- To split; separate; cleave; chop.
- After 'frosting' the stone may be 'clived' or split along the bedding planes. Once clived, the thin slabs are dressed for use and sold as Collyweston Slates, for use as tilestones.1990, John Ashurst, Francis G. Dimes, Conservation of building and decorative stone: Volume 1
- IL-1β presents the peculiarity of being produced in the form of a biologically inactive precursor, known as proIL-1β, that needs to be clived at an aspartate residue by a specific enzyme, named interleukin-1β converting enzyme (ICE) or [...]2007, Robert Ader, Psychoneuroimmunology
Proper noun capitalized: Clive
Clive
- A topographic surname from Old English - someone who lived near a cliff (Old English clif).
- A male given name transferred from the surname, popular in Britain in the mid-twentieth century.
- "I suppose you," she said, "were named for General Clive." "I was. And my father was named for General Brock."1949, Mazo de la Roche, Mary Wakefield, Dundurn Press, published 2009, →ISBN, page 132
- A village in Lacombe County, Alberta, Canada.
- A city in Dallas County and Polk County, Iowa, United States.
- An unincorporated community in Tooele County, Utah, United States.
- A town on the Clive River in Hawke's Bay region, New Zealand.
- An eastern suburb of Winsford, Cheshire West and Chester, Cheshire, England (OS grid ref SJ6766).
- A village and civil parish in north Shropshire, England (OS grid ref SJ5124).
Forms of clive
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | clives |
| present participle | cliving |
| past | clived |
| past | clove |
| past participle | clived |
| past participle | clove |
| past participle | cliven |
| Noun | |
| plural | clives |
Origin of clive
From Middle English cliven, from Old English clīfan (“to cleave, adhere, stick”), from Proto-West Germanic *klīban, from Proto-Germanic *klībaną (“to glue, stick”), from Proto-Indo-European *gleybʰ- (“to lubricate, stick”). Cognate with Dutch kleven (“to adhere, stick”), German kleben (“to adhere, stick”), Swedish kliva (“to climb, stalk”), Icelandic klífa (“to climb, ascend”).
From Middle English *clive (in compound: Middle English garclive), from Old English clīfe (“clifers (cleavers), burdock”), from Proto-West Germanic *klībā. Cognate with Middle Dutch kleve, klijve (“burdock”), Middle Low German klive (“burdock”).
From Middle English cliven, from Old Norse klyfja, klufða (“to split, chop, cleave”), from Proto-Germanic *kleubaną (“to split, pick”), from Proto-Indo-European *glewbʰ- (“to cut, carve, peel”). Cognate with Old English clēofan (“to cleave, split, separate”). Doublet of cleave.
Words that rhyme with clive
34 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about clive
- What does clive mean?
- Clive means to climb; ascend.
- What part of speech is clive?
- Clive can be a verb, a noun or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce clive?
- Clive is pronounced /ˈklaɪv/.
- What is the past tense of clive?
- The past tense of clive is clived.
Words near clive in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: clive (page history and authors); Clive (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Clive.wav.
Cite this entry: “clive.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/clive. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.