shear
/ʃɪə/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.40 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To remove the fleece from (a sheep, llama, etc.) by clipping.
Intransitive verb; Transitive verb
verb
To cut, originally with a sword or other bladed weapon, now usually with shears, or as if using shears.
verb
Example Sentences
- "shear the llamas"
- "shear the afro off someone's head"
- "So trenchant was the Templar’s weapon, that it shore asunder, as it had been a willow twig, the tough and plaited handle of the mace, which the ill-fated Saxon reared to parry the blow, and, descending on his head, levelled him with the earth."
- "the golden tresses […] were shorn away"
- "The total along-the-runway wind component sheared from an 8-knot headwind to about a 56-knot tailwind over a 44-second period."
- "Soon as the bending Scythe, And Sickle keen, have shear'd the golden Grain, Array'd in all the Equipage of Death, Forth the stern Sportsman stalks"
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker-der. Proto-Germanic *skeraną Proto-West Germanic *skeran Old English sċieran Middle English scheren English shear From Middle English sheren, scheren, from Old English sċieran (“to shear; to shave”), from Proto-West Germanic *skeran, from Proto-Germanic *skeraną, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut”). Cognate with West Frisian skarre, Low German, Dutch, and German scheren, Danish skære, Norwegian Bokmål skjære, Norwegian Nynorsk skjera, Swedish skära, Faroese and Icelandic skera, (borrowed from Germanic) Finnish keritä; and (from Indo-European) with Kamkata-viri ċarë́- (“to chop”), Ancient Greek κείρω (keírō, “to cut off”), Latin caro (“flesh”), Albanian shqerr (“to tear, cut”), harr (“to cut, to mow”), Lithuanian ski̇̀rti (“separate”), Welsh ysgar (“separate”). See also sharp.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ʃɪə/
- British English: /ʃɪə/