rive
/ɹaɪv/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.44 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To use a technique of splitting or sawing wood radially from a log (e.g. clapboards).
verb
To land.
Example Sentences
- "I have seen tempests, when the scolding winds / Have rived the knotty oaks[…]"
- "And therwith she toke the swerd from her loue that lay ded and fylle to the ground in a swowne / And whan she aroos she made grete dole out of mesure / the whiche sorowe greued Balyn passyngly sore / and he wente vnto her for to haue taken the swerd oute of her hād but[…]sodenly she sette the pomell to the ground / and rofe her self thorow the body"
- "And the sword that had visited Earth from so far away smote like the falling of thunderbolts [...] and the runes in Alveric’s far-travelled sword exulted, and roared at the elf-knight; until in the dark of the wood, amongst branches severed from disenchanted trees, with a blow like that of a thunderbolt riving an oak-tree, Alveric slew him."
- "The varlet at his plaint was grieu'd so sore, / That his deepe wounded hart in two did riue[…]."
- "Freestone i.e. that rives, splits, and breaks in any direction."
- "To the west, the country descends more gradually to the extensive plains of the Nile Valley but is riven by the rugged valleys of the Takezze and other Nile tributaries."
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁reyp- Proto-Germanic *rīfaną Old Norse rífabor. Middle English riven English rive From Middle English riven (“to rive”), of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse rífa (“to rend, tear apart”), from Proto-Germanic *rīfaną (“to tear, scratch”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁reyp- (“to crumble, tear”). Cognate with Danish rive (“to tear”), Old Frisian rīva (“to tear”), Old English ārǣfan (“to let loose, unwrap”), Old Norse ript (“breach of contract, rift”), Norwegian Bokmål rive (“to tear”), Swedish riva (”to tear”) and Albanian rrip (“belt, rope”). More at rift.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ɹaɪv/
- British English: /ɹaɪv/