stave
/steɪv/
stave noun: one of a number of narrow strips of wood, or narrow iron plates, placed edge to edge to form the sides, covering, or lining of a vessel or structure; especially, one of the strips which form the sides of a cask, barrel, pail, etc.
Noun
stave (plural staves)
- One of a number of narrow strips of wood, or narrow iron plates, placed edge to edge to form the sides, covering, or lining of a vessel or structure; especially, one of the strips which form the sides of a cask, barrel, pail, etc.
- For the Cherubims ſpread foorth their wings ouer the place of the Arke, and the Cherubims couered the Arke and the ſtaues thereof, aboue.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Chronicles 5:8
- One of the bars or rounds of a rack, rungs of a ladder, etc; one of the cylindrical bars of a lantern wheel
- A metrical portion; a stanza; a staff.
- Let us chaunt a passing stave / In honour of that hero brave.1815, William Wordsworth, Rob Roy's Grave
- The set of five horizontal and parallel lines on and between which musical notes are written or pointed; the staff.
- The initial consonant, consonant cluster, or vowel of a word which rhymes with another word with the same consonant or vowel in stave-rhyme.
- Ley, in his work on the Metrical Forms of Hebrew Poetry, 1866, has taken too little notice of these frequently occurring alliteration staves; Lagarde communicated to me (8th Sept. 1846) his view of the stave-rhyme in the Book[…]1874, Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon, page 73
- [The] stave that binds the two halves of the line together the on-verse must be classified as D in spite of the f-stave . . stave-rhyme (OED s.v. Stave sb.)1974, John Collins Pope, Old English Studies in Honour of John C. Pope, page 193
- A sign, symbol or sigil, including rune or rune-like characters, used in Icelandic magic.
- A staff or walking stick.
Verb
stave (third-person singular simple present staves, present participle staving, simple past staved or (dated) stove, past participle staved or (dated) stove or (dialectal) stoven)
- To fit or furnish with staves or rundles.
- vpon paine of death to bring it out and to ſtaue it1603, Richard Knolles, The Generall Historie of the Turkes, […], London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC
- To break in the staves of; to break a hole in; to burst.
- to stave in a cask
- A great Sea constant runs here upon the Rocks, and before they got to Land their Boat was stav’d in Pieces […]1743, Robert Drury, The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar, London, page 12
- To push, or keep off, as with a staff.
- The condition of a servant staves him off to a distance.1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London
- To delay by force or craft; to drive away.
- We ate grass in an attempt to stave off our hunger.
- Congress had authorized seeds to be granted to the farmers there to stave hunger, but President Cleveland vetoed the bill.2009, Brent Stransky, The Young Conservative's Field Guide, page 39
- To burst in pieces by striking against something.
- But Donald would not hear of that proposal at all, assuring the Prince that it was impossible for them to return to the land again, because the squall was against them, and that if they should steer for the rock the boat would undoubtedly stave to pieces and all of them behoved to be drowned, for...1746, Robert Forbes, The Lyon in Mourning, volume 1, page 164
- To walk or move rapidly.
- He turned and blundered out of the house, stumbling over a chair and trying a wrong door on the way, and went staving down the street as if afraid to look behind him.1845, The Century Magazine, volume 48, page 41
- To suffer, or cause to be lost by breaking the cask.
- All the […]wine in the city hath been staved.1615, George Sandys, “(please specify the page)”, in The Relation of a Iourney Begun An: Dom: 1610. […], London: […] [Richard Field] for W. Barrett, →OCLC
- To render impervious or solid by driving with a calking iron.
- to stave lead, or the joints of pipes into which lead has been run
Proper noun capitalized: Stave
Stave (plural Staves)
- A surname.
stave meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
stave in Hindi
- स्टेव, स्टेव करें
stave in Tamil
- பழுப்பட்டி
stave in Marathi
- स्टेव्ह
stave in Urdu
- لکڑی کے پتلے
More languagesFewer languages
- stave in Bengali
- লাঠি, দণ্ড, পিপার কাঠ
- stave in Telugu
- స్టేవ్
- stave in Kannada
- ನಿವಾರಿಸು, ತಡೆಯು, ತೆಗೆದು ದೂರಕ್ಕೆ ಬಿಸಾಕು, ಸದ್ಯಕ್ಕೆ ದೂರಮಾಡು
- stave in Punjabi
- ਡੰਡਾ ḍaṇḍā
- stave in Odia
- ଷ୍ଟେଭ
- stave in Nepali
- स्टेभ, स्ट्याभ
- stave in Indonesian
- balok not, notenbalk, paranada, sangkar nada
Examples of stave in a sentence
- And therefore three cheers for Nantucket; and come a stove boat and stove body when they will, for stave my soul, Jove himself cannot.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 7, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London...
- Don’t stave the boats needlessly, ye harpooneers; good white cedar plank is raised full three per cent within the year.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “Chapter 22”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers...
- […]for the jagged butt of the fallen mast was dashing against the ship's side with such vicious blows that it seemed but a matter of seconds ere it would stave a hole in her.1914 October – 1916 July, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Mucker, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., published 31 October 1921...
Forms of stave
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | staves |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | staves |
| present participle | staving |
| past | staved |
| past participle | staved |
| past (dated) | stove |
| past participle (dated) | stove |
| past participle (dialectal) | stoven |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Staves |
Origin of stave
Back-formation from staves, the plural of staff.
Various origins: * Borrowed from North German Stave, an occupational surname for a judge or church official, from Middle Low German Staf (“staff”). * Borrowed from Norwegian Stave, a habitational surname from five farmsteads in the country. * Americanized form of Polish Staw, a Jewish Ashkenazi surname.
Words formed from stave
Phrases with stave
Words that rhyme with stave
Questions about stave
- What does stave mean?
- Stave means one of a number of narrow strips of wood, or narrow iron plates, placed edge to edge to form the sides, covering, or lining of a vessel or structure; especially, one of the strips which form the sides of a cask, barrel, pail, etc.
- What is stave in Hindi?
- Stave in Hindi is स्टेव, स्टेव करें. See Stave meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use stave in a sentence?
- And therefore three cheers for Nantucket; and come a stove boat and stove body when they will, for stave my soul, Jove himself cannot.
- What part of speech is stave?
- Stave can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce stave?
- Stave is pronounced /steɪv/.
- What is the plural of stave?
- The plural of stave is staves.
Words near stave in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: stave (page history and authors); Stave (page history and authors); stave (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stave (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); stave (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stave (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); stave (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); stave (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stave (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਡੰਡਾ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); stave (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); stave (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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)-Wodencafe-stave.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-stave.wav.
Cite this entry: “stave.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/stave. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.