thrave

English

Etymology 1

(deprecated template usage)

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle English thraven, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old English þrafian (“to press; urge; compel; rebuke; argue; contend”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Germanic *þrabōną (“to press; drive”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Proto-Indo-European *trep- (“to scamper; trample; quake; tread”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian troawje, droawje (“to trot”), West Frisian drave (“to trot”), Dutch draven (“to lope; trot”), German traben (“to trot”), Swedish trava (“to trot”), Icelandic þrefa (“to wrangle; dispute”).

Verb

thrave (third-person singular simple present thrav, present participle ing, simple past and past participle thraved)

1. (transitive, UK, dialectal) To urge; compel; importune.

Related terms

• thraft

Etymology 2

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle English thrave, threve, thrafe, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old Norse þrefi (“a bunch or handful of sheaves”), related to Old Norse þrifa (“to grasp”). Cognate with Swedish trave, Danish trave.

Alternative forms

• threave (obsolete), threve (obsolete)

Noun

thrave (plural thraves)

1. (UK, dialect) A sheaf; a handful.
2. (UK, dialect, obsolete) Twenty-four (or in some places, twelve) sheaves of wheat; a shock, or stook.
3. (UK, dialect, obsolete) Two dozen, or similar indefinite number; a bunch; a throng.
   • Lansdowne MS

     The worst of a thrave.

   • Bishop Hall

     He sends forth thraves of ballads to the sale.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “thrave”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Anagrams

• raveth