snathe

English

Etymology

From Old English snǣdan (“to slice”), from Proto-Germanic *snaidijaną.

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -eɪð

Verb

snathe (third-person singular simple present snathes, present participle snathing, simple past and past participle snathed)

1. (UK, archaic) To lop; to prune.
2. To snatch.
   • 1924, John Milton, Some Newly Discovered Stanzas, page 149:

     Meleager's mother mad at his offence In that death by his hand had summon'd thence Her Brothers: snathes up the fatall brand which she , which did his life command, And on a flagrant altar it she layes, The which consuming her sons life betray's.

   • 2013, Percarus, Percarus:

     The fair dame was able to snathe the best candidates— She pathed good souls to the noble way and educates.

   • 2016, Walter Macken, Quench the Moon:

     To be out, ready to snathe a salmon or to blind a pheasant on his perch, and all the time to know that there was a certain element of risk, that unless you remained all the time conscious of this risk you might be jumped on by one of the Finnertys, made your blood course faster through your veins and made your heart thump heavily, so that when you did reach home you sank into a heavy exhausted sleep immediately, and woke in the morning wondering what the hell you wanted to be doing things like that for.

Noun

snathe (plural snathes)

1. Alternative form of snath (“shaft of a scythe”)
   • 1841, The Law Reporter - Volume 3, page 384:

     Before the patent of Peirce, the nibs of scythes had been clumsily fastened to the snathe by means of an iron ring, tightened by wedges.

   • 2011, Roderick L. Haig-Brown, Measure of the Year:

     Mine is an old ridge-backed twenty-eight-inch blade that I inherited with the place and set on a new snathe.

   • 2022, Michael Brown, Guide to Medieval Gardens: Gardens in the Age of Chivalry:

     The resulting scythe is heavier and more difficult to use than a bent snathe.

References

• “snathe”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• Nathes, thanes, Hasten, hasten, Athens, sneath, Tehans, Sneath, Anthes