scab
pronunciation
How to pronounce scab in British English: UK [skæb]
How to pronounce scab in American English: US [skæb]
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- Noun:
- someone who works (or provides workers) during a strike
- the crustlike surface of a healing skin lesion
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- Verb:
- form a scab
- take the place of work of someone on strike
Word Origin
- scab
- scab: [13] Old English had a word sceabb ‘scab’. This survived into modern English as shab, a dialectal synonym of scab, but it is only represented in the mainstream language by its derivative shabby. It is its Old Norse relative skabbr, borrowed in the 13th century as scab, which has become the general English term for a ‘crust over a wound’.The derogatory sense ‘strike-breaker’ emerged in the 19th century from an earlier, 16th-century ‘despicable person’. The word comes ultimately from the Germanic base *skab- ‘scratch, shave’ (source also of English shave [OE]), which was descended from the same Indo-European base that produced Latin scabiēs ‘itch’ (source of English scabies [14], scabious [14] – a plant so called because it was supposed to cure skin diseases – and scabrous [17]).=> scabies, shabby, shave
- scab (n.)
- mid-13c., "skin disease," developed from Old English sceabb "scab, itch" (related to scafan "to shave, scrape, scratch") and from Old Norse skabb "scab, itch," both from Proto-Germanic *skab- "scratch, shave," from PIE *(s)kep- "to cut, scrape, hack" (see scabies). Sense reinforced by cognate Latin scabies "scab, itch, mange" (from scabere "to scratch"). Meaning "crust which forms over a wound or sore" is first attested c. 1400. Meaning "strikebreaker" first recorded 1806, from earlier sense of "person who refuses to join a trade union" (1777), probably from meaning "despicable person" (1580s), possibly borrowed in this sense from Middle Dutch.
Example
- 1. When you cut yourself , blood clots and forms a scab .
- 2. The blood scab has stiffened .
- 3. In his heart of hearts , he sympathized with the strikers and hated this " scab . "
- 4. He found himself picking at the scab on his left hand as he continued walking .
- 5. The resistance of wheat to scab mainly showed partially dominant effect .