Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A beehive, especially one of straw.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A vessel of wood, wickerwork, etc., used especially as a receptacle for grain; hence, a basket, varying in size, shape, material, or use, according to locality.
- n. The amount contained in a skep: used formerly as a specific measure of capacity.
- n. A vehicle consisting of a large wicker basket mounted on wheels, used to convey cops, etc., about a factory.
- n. A small wooden or metal utensil used for taking up yeast.
- n. A beehive made of straw or wicker-work.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Obs. or Prov. Eng. & Scot. A coarse round farm basket.
- n. Prov. Eng. & Scot. A beehive.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a large round wicker basket (used on farms)
- n. a domed beehive made of twisted straw
Etymologies
- Late Old English sceppe, from Old Norse skeppa ‘basket’. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, basket, from Old Norse skeppa, a dry measure, and from Old English sceppe (from Old Norse skeppa). (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Several of the men were there standing about the square iron-bound box attached by a wire rope to a wheel overhead, and known as the skep, which, with another, would be the conveyances of the ore that was to be found, from deep down in the mine to the surface, or, as the miners termed it, to grass; and until the man-engine was finished this was the ordinary way up and down.”
“As he could no longer conveniently throw the earth from the hole he took a "skep" or leaf basket, which lay handy, and, placing it beside him, put as much of the sandy soil as he could carry into it, and then lifting shot it on the edge of the pit.”
“People, you must "skep" when it rains, as the clouds are drying up in this, our beloved country!”
“In the vegetable garden a traditional straw bee skep looks like it belongs.”
Suzy Bales: For A Garden's Bad Hair Days, The Art of Distraction
“I had to laugh as I read the author's rhapsody about my bee skep.”
Suzy Bales: For A Garden's Bad Hair Days, The Art of Distraction
“Die verdeeldheid van die verlede te heel en 'n samelewing gegrond op demokratiese waardes, maatskaplike geregtigheid en basiese menseregte te skep;”
Budget Speech 2008 by the Minister of Finance, Trevor A Manuel
“And his new book, "A Death in Belmont," in stores April 18, ought to make skep-tics give the guy a rethink.”
“All the backing and shifting you do does nothing but give the impression that every time the light begins to dawn—the light that you so earnestly believe you provide for so me women—you skep desperately away from it.”
“Aren't they looking -- isn't GM looking at hydrogen, sort of, they're looking to skip this skep, this step, excuse me, and going on to the next one?”
“Crossing the meadow, Konstantin Levin came out onto the road, and met an old man with a swollen eye, carrying a skep on his shoulder.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘skep’.
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Some (More) Beekeeping Terms
Interesting words and phrases used by beekeepers.
Some of these appear in Palooka's list of beekeeping terms, and this list by Sionnach. Feel free to add your favorites!absconding swarm, worker comb, winter cluster, acarine disease, Bacillus larvae, afterswarm, wax moth, uniting, American foulbrood, bee bread, bee brush, bee blower and 99 more...
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AGRI - apiculture
lucerne, HMF, Heather, harvest, glucose, honey, fluid, Erica, Gaucho, microscopic, enzym, tea tree and 183 more...
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phrontistery-s
from phrontistery.info
sabaton, sabbatarian, sabbulonarium, sabelline, sabin, sable, sabliere, sabot, sabretache, sabulous, saburration, saccade and 1593 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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English Weights and Measures
Most of these are names of weights and measures in use before 1500, gleaned from household accounts of English estates and colleges.
pondus, clove, wey, charrus, pisa, sum, seam, petra, fatt, peck, quarter, skep and 49 more...
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Unusual words for Words With Friends
A list of words that WWF recognizes as valid - most are unusual words; some are simply high-scoring.
botel, slipe, jeu, chub, chubs, cote, mure, tittle, dev, loo, hoke, helo and 357 more...
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Really Cool Four-Letter Words
I marvel at the amazing variety of four-letter words in the English language. And that's not even counting really common (to me) words like fuck.
ibis, pelf, sofa, iota, oboe, lava, icon, sped, puha, pulp, puma, kyat and 150 more...
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Flora and Fauna
poa annua, pooka, vole, bestiary, popple, turgor, starling, sharpy, copse, coreopsis, clove, corvid and 348 more...
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Pseudorandom words
Words found through Wordie's random word function. I didn't take phrases, foreign, misspelled, or madeupical words, so I looked at about 200 words to assemble this list.
I was surprise...ishkabibble, jericho, inopercular, oppositional, puerility, chronometer, cavern, cisternae, osteospermum, boxcar, misandry, savannah and 88 more...
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words to learn
ecclesiarch, decennium, decennary, galactosemia, tautogeneity, quadrature, vellum, wainwright, addax, quadrumane, omnisentient, glyphography and 75 more...
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A hive for the honey bee
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
And live alone ...absconding swarm, afterswarm, alighting board, american foulbrood, apiary, apiculture, apis mellifera, bee blower, bee bread, bee brush, beehive, beeswax and 71 more...
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October List
sposh, jowlop, slampamp, spot rump, finikin, livedo, nidget, mulmul, mugient, olm, pawl, dapifer and 76 more...
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Expand my Vocab by 100
Tweets
Looking for tweets for skep.
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