zeriba
/zəˈɹiːbə/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
17
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A fence of the type once commonly improvised in northeastern Africa from thornbushes.
noun
An improvised stockade, particularly those similarly located and constructed.
verb
To erect or take refuge within a zeriba.
Example Sentences
- "On the left shore two neat farmyards shew themselves in a shining seriba of reeds, the stalks of which are connected very regularly with each other, but perhaps only afford resistance to tame animals."
- "1895, A. H. Keane, Africa, Volume I, North Africa, (Stanford’s Compendium of Geography and Travel), London: Edward Stanford, Chapter 5, p. 245, footnote 1, In Arabic zeriba means any kind of rough and ready fenced enclosure; hence the expression “zeriba country” applied by some geographers to the northern slope of the Nile-Congo divide, where the Arab traders and slave-hunters had founded numerous palisaded stations long before the establishment of the Egyptian administration in that region."
- "The Black Watch (Royal Highlanders) advanced this morning to Baker Pasha’s zariba."
- "I clutched at a gun - my pockets were full of cartridges - and, parting the thorn bushes at the gate of our zareba, quickly slipped out."
- "[…] forming a zariba, or square, to resist cavalry."
- "Once you had passed the initial zareba of fruit stands, souvenir stands, ice-cream stands, and the lair of the enthusiast whose aim in life it was to sell you picture postal-cards, and had won through to the long walk where the seats were, you were practically alone with Nature."
Etymology
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: زَرِيبَة, ز ر ب
Inflected Forms
zeribas (plural)
zareba (alternative)
zariba (alternative)
seriba (alternative)
sariba (alternative)
zerybeh (alternative)
zereba (alternative)
zareeba (alternative)
zerriba (alternative)
zeribas (present, singular)
zeribaing (participle, present)
zeribaed (participle, past)