Stave /(stāv)/

Stave

n.
  1. One of a number of narrow strips of wood, or narrow iron plates, placed edge to edge to form the sides, covering, or lining of a vessel or structure; esp., one of the strips which form the sides of a cask, a pail, etc.
  2. One of the cylindrical bars of a lantern wheel; one of the bars or rounds of a rack, a ladder, etc.
  3. A metrical portion; a stanza; a staff.
    Let us chant a passing stave In honor of that hero brave.
  4. The five horizontal and parallel lines on and between which musical notes are written or printed; the staff{7}. (Mus.) [Obs.]

Phrases & Compounds
Stave jointer
a machine for dressing the edges of staves.

Stave

v. t.

imp. & p. p. Staved; p. pr. & vb. n. Staving

  1. To break in a stave or the staves of; to break a hole in; to burst; -- often with in; as, to stave a cask; to stave in a boat.
  2. To push, as with a staff; -- with off.
    The condition of a servant staves him off to a distance.
  3. To delay by force or craft; to drive away; -- usually with off; as, to stave off the execution of a project.
    And answered with such craft as women use, Guilty or guiltless, to stave off a chance That breaks upon them perilously.
  4. To suffer, or cause, to be lost by breaking the cask.
    All the wine in the city has been staved.
    — Sandys.
  5. To furnish with staves or rundles.
  6. To render impervious or solid by driving with a calking iron; as, to stave lead, or the joints of pipes into which lead has been run.

Phrases & Compounds
To stave and tail
in bear baiting, (to stave) to interpose with the staff, doubtless to stop the bear; (to tail) to hold back the dog by the tail.

Stave

v. i.
  1. To burst in pieces by striking against something; to dash into fragments.
    Like a vessel of glass she stove and sank.