Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To seize and carry off forcibly.
- v. To deprive (one) of something; bereave.
- v. To rob, plunder, or pillage.
- v. Archaic To break or tear apart.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To take away by force or stealth; carry off as booty; take violently; purloin, especially in a foray: with a thing as object.
- To take away; remove; abstract; draw off.
- To rob; plunder; dispossess; bereave: with a person as object.
- To tear up, as the rafters or roof of a house.
- To ravel; pull to pieces, as a textile fabric.
- To practise plundering or pillaging; carry off stolen property.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To take away by violence or by stealth; to snatch away; to rob; to despoil; to bereave. [Archaic].
WordNet 3.0
- v. steal goods; take as spoils
Etymologies
- Alteration of rive by confusion with the above. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English reven, to plunder, from Old English rēafian; see reup- in Indo-European roots.Middle English reven, possibly alteration (influenced by reven, to plunder) of Old Norse rīfa, to rive. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Duke University, 1956, p. 274; and Carter Papers: An Inventory .... ") [7] The word" reave "meant to rob or strip at Carter's time.”
Letter from Robert Carter to [Robert Jones, October 18, 1728]
“Lest for her like of garden scents he reave her,577”
“What can I say, h-dog: I'm just not as impressed as you are by the guy who took his pique out on the poor innocent fig tree, and told me he came bringing not peace, but the sword, to reave apart families.”
“And he can be very cavalier about rhythm, especially the fiery accents that make a dance out of 'Wilt thou unkind thus reave me'.”
“No queenly way for woman to practise, though peerless she, that the weaver-of-peace 76 from warrior dear by wrath and lying his life should reave!”
“This may not work, he cautioned himself I can but try to reave the power from the humans.”
“Our aim had only been to reave some more weapons, especially light portable ones for our men-atarms.”
“To force a spotless virgin's chastity, To reave the orphan of his patrimony, To wring the widow from her custom'd right, And have no other reason for this wrong.”
“Saint Kiaranus alone, reading beside his herds; and they thought to slay him and to reave his herds.”
“At another time there came robbers to him when he was feeding the herds of his parents, wishing to slay him, so that they might the more easily reave what they would.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘reave’.
-
Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2046 more...
-
Undo
A list of terms that denote separating one thing from another, or deconstructing a thing into its parts or to a former state. E.g., untie, divorce, unscramble.
untie, divorce, unscramble, disunite, disjoin, undo, separate, disassemble, uncouple, unhitch, disassociate, disaffiliate and 185 more...
-
logos's list
A poor pathetic thing, but mine own.
invidious, lugubriousness, vilify, noisome, synastry, front and center, declension, conjugation, regnal, diphthong, circumlocution, bishopric and 141 more...
-
Q's words
sublimation, crepuscular, synesthesia, nave, murmuration, reve, reave, twain, asunder
-
There's a word for that?
temerity, tacit, froward, faineant, caterwaul, menagerie, ennui, sine qua non, lissom, multifarious, laconic, katzenjammer and 240 more...
-
Archaic
Because they just don't make 'em like they used to.
comeling, circuition, assentment, advisement, accompts, apertness, larum, soothfastness, deperdition, marish, covin, tinct and 166 more...
-
karnage's Words
furbelow, farinaceous, fendrake, rhizobium, imbricate, quaquaversal, exstasis, grapheme, scissiparity, apterous, obdurant, omphalos and 135 more...
-
rememberers
prolix, ageusia, animadversion, anodyne, antic, arabesque, beadle, brachymetropia, colophon, desquamation, diaphoresis, diegesis and 3251 more...
-
trustknot's Words
codger, curmudgeon, amok, torpid, turgid, craven, crepuscule, twilight, spry, mot juste, dross, schadenfreude and 66 more...
-
Words
fickle, redeem, disclosure, fortnight, depict, convey, scribe, affluent, commuter, defection, churn, vouch and 77 more...
-
Crookery
shylock, mulct, gyp, fleece, bilk, bamboozle, hornswoggle, hoodwink, flimflam, guile, pawky, hijinx and 32 more...
-
clementine's list
weltschmerz, eidolon, thambos, supper, trinket, wish, accidia, der treppenwitz, das backpfeifenge..., weltanschauung, arcady, revolution and 47 more...
-
Olden
wanse, heeld, Waugh, styll, breme, swarf, laund, ver, Hurst, Fae, thern, flet and 30 more...
-
Inkhorn
Hard words
Tweets
Looking for tweets for reave.
yarb One day I saw an old frayed but strong rope on this path, cast away on a tree stump, and I thought: yes, that is the awful end of such thoughts. Had I actually been tempted to kill myself? Aghast at the thought I took the rope back and reaved it up for use.
- Malcolm Lowry, The Forest Path to the Spring Jul 13, 2008