rove

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɹəʊv/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ɹoʊv/
• Rhymes: -əʊv

Probably from Middle English *roven, a Midlands variant of Northern Middle English raven (“to wander”), from Old Norse ráfa (“to rove; stray about”). Cognate with Icelandic ráfa (“to wander”), Scots rave (“to wander; stray; roam”).

rove (third-person singular simple present roves, present participle roving, simple past and past participle roved)

1. (obsolete, intransitive) To shoot with arrows (at).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene I.3:

     And thou […] that with thy cruell dart / At that good knight so cunningly didst roue […]

2. (intransitive) To roam, or wander about at random, especially over a wide area.
   • 1912: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan of the Apes, Chapter 1

     Now that he was in his prime, there was no simian in all the mighty forest through which he roved that dared contest his right to rule, nor did the other and larger animals molest him.

3. (transitive) To roam or wander through.
   • Milton

     Roving the field, I chanced / A goodly tree far distant to behold.

4. (transitive) To card wool or other fibres.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Jamieson to this entry?)

5. To twist slightly; to bring together, as slivers of wool or cotton, and twist slightly before spinning.
6. To draw through an eye or aperture.
7. To plough into ridges by turning the earth of two furrows together.
8. To practice robbery on the seas; to voyage about on the seas as a pirate.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Hakluyt to this entry?)

• rover
• roved
• roving

• reeve

rove (plural roves)

1. A copper washer upon which the end of a nail is clinched in boatbuilding.
2. A roll or sliver of wool or cotton drawn out and lightly twisted, preparatory to further processing; a roving.
3. The act of wandering; a ramble.
   • Young

     In thy nocturnal rove one moment halt.

Inflected forms.

rove

1. simple past tense of rive
2. simple past tense of reeve

• -vore, Vore, over, over-, vore

• Audio

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rove

1. (archaic) singular present subjunctive of roven

• over, Voer, voer

rove

1. Small container made of birch bark.

• tuokkonen

• vero