snub

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /snʌb/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ʌb

Etymology 1

From Middle English snubben (also snibben), from Old Norse snubba (“to curse, chide, snub, scold, reprove”). Cognate with Danish snibbe, dialectal Swedish snebba.

Adjective

snub (comparative more snub, superlative most snub)

1. Conspicuously short.

   a snub-nosed revolver

2. (of a nose) Flat and broad, with the end slightly turned up.
   • 1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 2, in An Autobiography, part II, London: Collins, →ISBN:

     If I close my eyes I can see Marie today as I saw her then. Round, rosy face, snub nose, dark hair piled up in a chignon.

3. (mathematics, of a polyhedron) Derived from a simpler polyhedron by the addition of extra triangular faces.

Derived terms

Derived terms

• retrosnub
• snub cube
• snub disphenoid

• snub dodecahedron
• snub nose
• snub polyhedron

Translations

conspicuously short

• Dutch: stomp (nl)
• Finnish: tynkä- (fi)
• Hebrew: חָרוּם‎ (he) m (ẖarúm)

• Italian: camuso (it)
• Maori: noke (of the nose)

derived from a simpler polyhedron by the addition of triangular faces

• Finnish: pullistettu

• Latin: triangulatus m

Noun

snub (plural snubs)

1. A deliberate affront or slight.

   I hope the people we couldn't invite don't see it as a snub.

   • 2017 January 14, “Thailand's new king rejects the army's proposed constitution”, in The Economist‎^[1]:

     The bluntness of King Vajiralongkorn's intervention—and the determination it reveals to resist relatively small checks on royal power—is both a snub to the junta and a worry for democrats, some of whom had dared hope that the new king might be happy to take a back seat in public life.

2. A sudden checking of a cable or rope.
3. (obsolete) A knot; a protuberance; a snag.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Qveene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for VVilliam Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938, book I, canto VIII, stanza 7:

     [A club] with ragged snubs and knotty grain.

Derived terms

• snubbing post
• snub line

Translations

deliberate affront or slight

• Catalan: desdeny (ca) m, menyspreu (ca) m, menysteniment m, desconsideració f
• Dutch: bruuskeren (nl), sneer (nl) f
• Finnish: solvaus (fi)
• French: camouflet (fr) m
• German: Brüskierung f
• Italian: affronto (it) m, mancanza di rispetto f

• Maori: pī, whakamanioro, tokoreko
• Persian: بی توجهی‎
• Polish: awania f (dated), obraza (pl) f
• Russian: пренебрежи́тельное обхожде́ние n (prenebrežítelʹnoje obxoždénije)
• Spanish: desaire (es) m

A sudden checking of a cable or rope

• Dutch: ruk (nl) m

Verb

snub (third-person singular simple present snubs, present participle snubbing, simple past and past participle snubbed)

1. (transitive) To slight, ignore or behave coldly toward someone.
   • 1922, Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit

     For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him. He was naturally shy, and being only made of velveteen, some of the more expensive toys quite snubbed him.

2. (transitive) To turn down insultingly; to dismiss.

   He snubbed my offer of help.

3. (transitive) To check; to reprimand.
4. (transitive) To stub out (a cigarette etc).
5. (transitive) To halt the movement of a rope etc by turning it about a cleat or bollard etc; to secure a vessel in this manner.
6. (transitive) To clip or break off the end of; to check or stunt the growth of.

Synonyms

• (to slight or ignore): give someone the cold shoulder, turn the cold shoulder on someone, cut someone cold, cut someone dead

Translations

to slight, ignore, behave coldly toward

• Catalan: desdenyar (ca), menyspreuar, menystenir (ca), desconsiderar (ca)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: please add this translation if you can

• Esperanto: please add this translation if you can
• Finnish: vähätellä (fi), sivuuttaa (fi)
• French: snober (fr)
• German: brüskieren (de), jemanden vor den Kopf stoßen
• Japanese: please add this translation if you can

• Khmer: please add this translation if you can
• Maori: tokoreko, pī
• Russian: пренебрежительно (prenebrežitelʹno) обходи́ться (obxodítʹsja) (prenebrežítelʹno obxodítʹsja) (с (s) + instrumental case)
• Spanish: desairar (es), hacer un feo
• Swedish: avfärda (sv)
• Thai: please add this translation if you can

to turn down, dismiss

• Finnish: torjua (fi)
• French: snober (fr)
• German: ablehnen (de), abtun (de), ausschlagen (offer)

• Maori: whakahoe
• Swedish: avfärda (sv)

to stub out

• Finnish: tumpata (fi)

• Russian: погаси́ть (ru) (pogasítʹ)

to halt the movement of a rope etc.

Etymology 2

Compare Dutch snuiven (“to snort, to pant”), German schnauben, German dialect schnupfen (“to sob”), and English snuff (transitive verb).

Verb

snub (third-person singular simple present snubs, present participle snubbing, simple past and past participle snubbed)

1. To sob with convulsions.
   • 1621, Thomas Bedford, The Sinne Vnto Death:

     He striveth, strugleth, roareth, sobbeth, snubbeth, and ready he is to burst for anger.

Anagrams

• Buns, buns, nubs