shelve
/ʃɛlv/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.39 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To furnish (a place) with shelves; especially, to furnish (a library, etc.) with bookshelves.
Transitive verb
Example Sentences
- "to shelve a closet or a library"
- "The library needs volunteers to help shelve books."
- "Before breakfast I employed myself in airing my old bibliomaniacal hobby, entering all the books lately acquired into a temporary catalogue, so as to have them shelved and marked."
- "I love shelving ecstasy!"
- "I had a funny conversation with my dad last night about shelving. It's when you shelve a pill up your bum. It was a lovely dinner conversation. […] My parents were like, in our generation we didn't snort pills, we used to drop them because it's so bad to snort. I was like, Yeah, what about shelving? They were like What? I was, Oh no, I thought you'd know."
- "Some people use Ecstasy using a method known as "shafting" or "shelving" which involves inserting a pill or tablet into the anus."
Etymology
The verb is a back-formation from shelves, the plural of shelf (“flat, rigid structure, fixed at right angles to a wall or forming a part of a cabinet, desk, etc., and used to display, store, or support objects”). The noun is derived from etymology 1, verb sense 2 (“(obsolete) to hang over or project like a shelf”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *(s)kelH-, shelven
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ʃɛlv/
- British English: /ʃɛlv/
Usage
Inflected Forms
shelves (present, singular)
shelving (participle, present)
shelved (participle, past)
shelved (past)
shelves (plural)
no-table-tags (table tags)
glossary (inflection template)
shelved (first person, past)
shelvest (archaic, present)
shelved (past, second person)
shelvedst (archaic, past)
shelveth (archaic, present)