Word.ws English Dictionary

skein

/skeɪn/

skein noun: a quantity of thread, yarn, etc., wound on a reel then removed and loosely knotted into an oblong shape; a skein of cotton is formed by eighty turns of thread around a reel with a fifty-four inch diameter.

Noun (1)

skein (plural skeins)

  1. A quantity of thread, yarn, etc., wound on a reel then removed and loosely knotted into an oblong shape; a skein of cotton is formed by eighty turns of thread around a reel with a fifty-four inch diameter.
    • Some for very nede / Layde downe a skeyne of threde, / And some a skeyne of yarne; […]c. 1517 (date written; published c. 1545), John Skelton, “Here after Foloweth the Booke Called Elynour Rummynge. The Tunnyng of Elynour Rummyng per Skelton Laureat.”, in Alexander Dyce, editor, The...
    • Reche me that skane of tewly sylk; / And, Wynde me that botowme of such an hew, / Grene, rede, tawny, whyte, blak, purpill, and blew.1523, John Skelton, “A Ryght Delectable Tratyse vpon a Goodly Garlande or Chapelet of Laurell, […]”, in Alexander Dyce, editor, The Poetical Works of John Skelton: […], volume I, London: Thomas Rodd...
  2. (broadly) The membrane of a fish ovary.
  3. (UK, broadly, collective, dialectal) A group of wildfowl (for example, geese or swans) in flight.
    • High above the swallows and 2 miles or so out into the Channel was a skein of geese, probably brent geese on the first day of their emigration from the estuaries of the Channel coast towards the high Arctic tundra of Spitsbergen or Russia.2018, Laurence Rose, “France”, in The Long Spring: Tracking the Arrival of Spring through Europe, London: Bloomsbury Wildlife, →ISBN, page 111
    • A group of geese is called a gaggle. […] They're only referred to as a gaggle when they're on land. When they're flying in formation they can be referred to as a skein.[2019 June 6, “Newsround: A Gaggle, a Confusion and a Conspiracy – Bizarre Animal Collective Group Names”, in CBBC, BBC, archived from the original on 14 Aug 2025
  4. (also, attributive, broadly, obsolete) Synonym of spireme (“the tangled mass of strands of chromatin seen in the early stages of mitosis, originally believed to be a single continuous strand (or two in a diploid cell, etc.)”).
    Synonyms:
    spireme
  5. (figuratively) A tangle, a weave, a web.
    • Not that I ſee through his perplexed plots, / And hidden ends, nor that my parts depend / Vpon the vnvvinding this ſo knotted skeane, / Doe I beſeech your patience.1625 (first performance), Ben[jamin] Jonson, The Staple of Newes. […], London: […] I[ohn] B[eale] for Robert Allot […], published 1631, →OCLC, Act V, scene ii, page 68
    • They diſentangle from the puzzled ſkein / In vvhich obſcurity has vvrapp'd them up, / The threads of politic and ſhrevvd deſign / That ran through all his purposes, […]1785, William Cowper, “Book III. The Garden.”, in The Task, a Poem, […], London: […] J[oseph] Johnson; […], →OCLC, page 98
  6. (figuratively) A winning streak.
  7. (US, dated, figuratively) A series created by a web (“major broadcasting network”).
    • All three tele skeins are pitching furiously to snag the super Easter Day tele show to be bankrolled by Frigidaire, but no decision has been reached at press time. […] Bankroller will buy time on the skein delivering the largest number of live coaxial outlets, but none of the webs are as yet able...1950 March 4, “Three Tele Nets All-out to Grab Frigidaire Show”, in Roger S. Littleford Jr., editor, The Billboard: The World’s Foremost Amusement Weekly, volume 62, number 9, Cincinnati, Oh.: Roger...
    • Three comedy shows from the U.S. are in the CTV lineup: CBS-TV's Phil Silvers and Danny Thomas skeins and NBC-TV's "Harry's Girls."1963, Radio Television Daily, volume 93, New York, N.Y.: Scheuer Publications, →OCLC, page 5, column 4

Verb

skein (third-person singular simple present skeins, present participle skeining, simple past and past participle skeined)

  1. (transitive) To weave or wind (thread, yarn, etc.) into a skein (noun etymology 1, noun sense 1).
    • Under section 7 of Act March 3, 1883, referring to section 2907, Rev. St., if skeining worsted or mohair yarns is necessary to render them merchantable yarns, the cost of skeining is a part of the value of the goods, and subject to duty. If skeining is necessary only for convenience in...1891, Mark Wilks Collet, reporter, “Stephenson v. Cooper, Collector”, in The Federal Reporter […] (National Reporter System, United States Series), volume 44, St. Paul, Minn.: West Publishing Co....
  2. (figuratively, transitive) To intertwine or weave (something) with another thing.
    • Water skeined the landscape. The Shannon River, lost since Limerick city, was drawing nearer to name the airport, and a tributary quickened its way towards it.1955, Elizabeth Bowen, chapter XI, in A World of Love, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, part I, pages 219–220

Noun (2)

skein (plural skeins)

  1. (transitive) A thin strip of an osier (“long, pliable twig from a plant, usually a willow”) used in basketmaking.
    • [F]or the finer work, as table-mats, fruit and work-baskets, and the like, the osiers are divided into four parts, lengthways, which are called splits, and these are afterwards reduced to various degrees of fineness, when they are called skeins.1836, Luke Hebert, “BASKET”, in The Engineer’s and Mechanic’s Encyclopædia, Comprehending Practical Illustrations of the Machinery and Processes Employed in Every Description of Manufacture of the...
  2. (US, dated, transitive) A metallic strengthening band or thimble on the wooden arm of an axle of a wagon.
    • On November 21, Dow, one of the free-state settlers went to the blacksmith's shop unarmed, carrying a waggon skein to be repaired. While he was at the shop, Coleman and Buckley of Missouri, and another pro-slavery man came up, all armed, and an angry discussion followed.1862, Thomas Hughes, “The Struggle for Kansas. The Substance of Two Lectures Delivered at the Working Men’s College, Great Ormond Street.”, in J[ohn] M[alcolm Forbes] Ludlow, A Sketch of the History...

skein meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

skein in Hindi

skein, hank
तागा tāgā

skein in Tamil

நூற்களி, புரி, பறக்கும் வாத்து, நாரை முதலியவைகளிறன் கூட்டம்

skein in Urdu

آنٹی, گولا, گتھی, لچھا, اڑتی بطخوں کا غول

skein in Bengali

সূতা, পশমের গুছি
More languagesFewer languages
skein in Kannada
ನೂಲಕಂಡಿಕೆ
skein in Tagalog
labay
skein in Indonesian
untai, kalut
skein in Persian
کلاف
skein in Thai
ไจ jai

Examples of skein in a sentence

  • "And well I know it, for he borrowed two skeins of my black wool to make it with!1920 October, Agatha Christie, “Fresh Suspicions”, in The Mysterious Affair at Styles […], New York, N.Y.; London: Grosset & Dunlap...
  • The more I leave the door unlatched / The sooner love is gone, / For love is but a skein unwound / Between the dark and dawn.1931 August 19 (date written), W[illiam] B[utler] Yeats, “Words for Music Perhaps. IV. Crazy Jane and Jack the Journeyman.”, in The Winding...
  • You hold the skein: wind, Thomas, wind / The thread of eternal life and death. / You hold this power, hold it.1938 March, T[homas] S[tearns] Eliot, “Part I”, in Murder in the Cathedral, London: Faber and Faber […], →OCLC, page 26:
  • 'tis as weak as spider's skein; / And shouldst thou break it—What, is it done so clean?1818, John Keats, “Book III”, in Endymion: A Poetic Romance, London: […] T[homas] Miller, […] for Taylor and Hessey, […], →OCLC, page 141...

All 15 example sentences with skein

Synonyms of skein

Forms of skein

Noun
pluralskeins
alternative formskain
alternative formskean
Verb
third-person singular presentskeins
present participleskeining
past participleskeined
pastskeined

Origin of skein

The noun is derived from Middle English skaine, skayne (“quantity of string, thread, etc., wound on a reel; the string, thread, etc., so wound”), from Old French escaigne (modern French écagne, écaigne (Picardy)); further etymology uncertain, probably from Proto-Celtic, from Proto-Indo-European *skend- (“to split off”). The verb is derived from noun. cognates * Irish scáinne (“skein, clew”)

From Dutch scheen (“strip of metal or wood; (anatomy) shin”), from Middle Dutch schene, from Old Dutch *skina, from Proto-West Germanic *skinu (“bar; track; (anatomy) shin; spine”), from Proto-Germanic *skinō (“piece; plate; rim; (anatomy) shinbone”), probably from Proto-Indo-European *skey- (“to dissect; to split”). Doublet of shin.

Words formed from skein

Words that rhyme with skein

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about skein

What does skein mean?
Skein means a quantity of thread, yarn, etc., wound on a reel then removed and loosely knotted into an oblong shape; a skein of cotton is formed by eighty turns of thread around a reel with a fifty-four inch diameter.
What is skein in Hindi?
Skein in Hindi is तागा (tāgā). See Skein meaning in Hindi.
How do you use skein in a sentence?
"And well I know it, for he borrowed two skeins of my black wool to make it with!
What part of speech is skein?
Skein can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce skein?
Skein is pronounced /skeɪn/ (UK).
What is the plural of skein?
The plural of skein is skeins.

Words near skein in the dictionary

  1. skegs
  2. Skehan
  3. Skehans
  4. skeiling
  5. skeilings
  6. skein
  7. skeine
  8. skeined
  9. skeiner
  10. skeiners
  11. skeines

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: skein (page history and authors); तागा (Hindi) (page history and authors); skein (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); skein (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); skein (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); skein (Kannada 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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-skein.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-skein.wav.

Cite this entry: “skein.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/skein. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.