scab
/skæb/
scab noun: an incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed during healing.
Noun
scab (countable and uncountable, plural scabs)
- An incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed during healing.
- The scabies.
- The mange, especially when it appears on sheep.
- Scab was the terror of the sheep farmer, and the peril of his calling.1882, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, volume 4, page 306
- Any of several different diseases of potatoes producing pits and other damage on their surface, caused by streptomyces bacteria (but formerly believed to be caused by a fungus).
- Common scab, a relatively harmless variety of scab (potato disease) caused by Streptomyces scabies.
- Any one of various more or less destructive fungal diseases that attack cultivated plants, forming dark-colored crustlike spots.
- A slight irregular protuberance which defaces the surface of a casting, caused by the breaking away of a part of the mold.
- A mean, dirty, paltry fellow.
- Out, scab!c. 1601–1602, William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, act 2, scene 5
- I would make thee the / loathsomest scab in Greece.c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- Synonyms:
- antimodel, bad guy, baddie, bastard, beggar, blackguard, bounder, cad, cockatrice, coistril
- A worker who acts against trade union policies; any picket crosser (strikebreaker), and especially one with devotion to union busting.
- When a scab comes down the street, men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out.c. 1910s, Jack London (attributed), The Scab
- Synonyms:
- blackleg, blacklegger, knobstick, scalie
Verb
scab (third-person singular simple present scabs, present participle scabbing, simple past and past participle scabbed)
- To become covered by a scab or scabs.
- To form into scabs and be shed, as damaged or diseased skin.
- Thoſe Puſtules aroſe, maturated, and ſcabbed off, intirely like the true Pox.1734, Royal Society of London, The Philosophical Transactions (1719 - 1733) Abridged, Volume 7, page 631
- Trev walked over and leaned down, dropping a tender kiss on her forehead where the skin was raw and scabbing from the cut.2009, Linda Wisdom, Wicked By Any Other Name, page 233
- To remove part of a surface (from).
- The beds shall be scabbed off to give a solid bearing, no pinning shall be admitted between the backing and the face stones and there shall be a good square joint not exceeding one inch in width, and the face stone shall be scabbed off to allow this.1891, Canadian Senate, Select Committee on Railways, Telegraphs and Harbours: Proceedings and Evidence, page 265
- To act as a strikebreaker.
- Don't scab for the bosses / Don't listen to their lies / Us poor folks haven't got a chance / Unless we organize.1931, “Which Side Are You On?”, performed by Florence Patton Reece
- Nobody desires to scab, to give most for least. The ambition of every individual is quite the opposite, to give least for most; and, as a result, living in a tooth-and-nail society, battle royal is waged by the ambitious individuals.1903 April 5, London, Jack, The Scab
- To beg (for), to cadge or bum.
- I scabbed some money off a friend.
- Finding a spot in a covered seating area that was more bus shelter than tourist-friendly, I unravelled a mother of a joint I′d scabbed off the garçon.2004, Niven Govinden, We are the New Romantics, Bloomsbury Publishing, UK, page 143
scab meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
scab in Hindi
- incrustation over a wound
- खुरंड khuraṇḍ
scab in Tamil
- பொருக்கு, அசறு, சிரங்கு, உதிரும் படை, மண் வெடிப்பு, சொறி அடக்கி
scab in Urdu
- incrustation over a wound
- کھرنڈ khuraṇḍ
scab in Bengali
- incrustation over a wound
- মামড়ি mamṛi
More languagesFewer languages
- scab in Telugu
- పక్కు pakku
- scab in Punjabi
- ਅੰਗੂਰ aṅgūr, ਖਰੀਂਡ kharīṇḍ
- scab in Tagalog
- langib
- scab in Arabic
- جُلْبَة julba
- scab in Malay
- kuping, keruping, keropeng
- scab in Persian
- کبره kabare
- scab in Thai
- ฝ้า fâa
- scab in Vietnamese
- vảy
Examples of scab in a sentence
- The bark that wasn′t already scabbed off was peppered with beetle holes.2009, Nancy Lord, Rock, Water, Wild: An Alaskan Life, page 121:
- And I can′t keep scabbing off my best friend.2010, Fiona Wood, Six Impossible Things, page 113:
Synonyms of scab
27 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of scab
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | scabs |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | scabs |
| present participle | scabbing |
| past participle | scabbed |
| past | scabbed |
Origin of scab
From Middle English scabb, scabbe (also as shabbe, schabbe > English shab), from Old English sċeabb and Old Norse skabb, both from Proto-Germanic *skabbaz (“scab, scabies”), from Proto-Indo-European *skabʰ- (“to cut, split, carve, shape”). Doublet of shab. Cognate with German Schabe (“scabies”), Danish skab (“scab, scabies”), Swedish skabb (“scab, scabies”), Latin scabies (“scab, itch, mange”). Related also to Old English scafan (“to scrape, shave”), Latin scabere (“to scratch”), English shabby.
Words formed from scab
Phrases with scab
Words that rhyme with scab
Questions about scab
- What does scab mean?
- Scab means an incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed during healing.
- What is scab in Hindi?
- Scab in Hindi is खुरंड (khuraṇḍ). See Scab meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use scab in a sentence?
- The bark that wasn′t already scabbed off was peppered with beetle holes.
- What part of speech is scab?
- Scab can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce scab?
- Scab is pronounced /skæb/.
- What is the plural of scab?
- The plural of scab is scabs.
Words near scab in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: scab (page history and authors); scab (Tamil Wiktionary) (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-scab.ogg.
Cite this entry: “scab.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/scab. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.