Word.ws English Dictionary

sleave

/sliːv/

sleave verb: to separate, as threads; to divide, as a collection of threads.

Verb

sleave (third-person singular simple present sleaves, present participle sleaving, simple past and past participle sleaved)

  1. To separate, as threads; to divide, as a collection of threads.
    Synonyms:
    sley

Noun

sleave (countable and uncountable, plural sleaves)

  1. The knotted or entangled part of silk or thread.
  2. Silk not yet twisted; floss.
    • Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care.c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...

Synonyms of sleave

Forms of sleave

Verb
third-person singular presentsleaves
present participlesleaving
past participlesleaved
pastsleaved
Noun
pluralsleaves

Origin of sleave

Compare Danish slöife, a loose knot, Swedish slejf (“a knot of ribbon”), German Schleife (“a loop”).

Words that rhyme with sleave

45 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about sleave

What does sleave mean?
Sleave means to separate, as threads; to divide, as a collection of threads.
What part of speech is sleave?
Sleave can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce sleave?
Sleave is pronounced /sliːv/.
What is the past tense of sleave?
The past tense of sleave is sleaved.

Words near sleave in the dictionary

  1. SLE
  2. Sleaford
  3. slean
  4. sleans
  5. Sleat
  6. sleave
  7. sleaved
  8. sleaves
  9. sleaving
  10. sleaze
  11. sleaze bucket

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sleave (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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