# crab
## English
### Pronunciation

* (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA: /kɹæb/, enPR: krăb
* Audio (US):(file)
* Rhymes: -æb

### Etymology 1

From Middle English crabbe, from Old English crabba (“crab; crayfish; cancer”), from Proto-West Germanic *krabbō, from Proto-Germanic *krabbô, from *krabbōną (“to creep, crawl”), from Proto-Indo-European *grobʰeh₂yéti (“scratch, claw at”), a metathesised o-grade of *gerbʰ-. More at carve.
See also Dutch krab, Low German Krabb, Danish krabbe, Swedish krabba.
Further cognates with frequentative-infix are Saterland Frisian krabbelje (“to creep, crawl”), Dutch krabbelen (“to scratch”) and German krabbeln (“to crawl”). Possibly related to English creep and Swedish krypa (“to creep, crawl”) etc.

#### Noun

crab (countable and uncountable, plural crabs)
* Any crustacean of the infraorder Brachyura, having five pairs of legs, the foremost of which are in the form of claws, and a carapace.
* (uncountable) The meat of this crustacean, served as food; crabmeat.
** 1959, Georgette Heyer, chapter 1, in The Unknown Ajax:But Richmond […] appeared to lose himself in his own reflections. Some pickled crab, which he had not touched, had been removed with a damson pie; and his sister saw […] that he had eaten no more than a spoonful of that either.
* Various other animals that resemble true crabs:
** Any of various crustacean in the infraorder Anomura, usually excluding squat lobsters.
    Despite its name, the hermit crab is not a true crab!
** A horseshoe crab.
* A bad-tempered person.
** 1983 April 30, Sue Hyde, “Expanding Worldviews”, in Gay Community News, page 12:She so obviously enjoyed every second of the concert that only the most stubborn crab could not have been warmed by her charm.
* (in plural crabs, informal) An infestation of pubic lice (Pthirus pubis).
    Although crabs themselves are an easily treated inconvenience, the patient and his partner(s) clearly run major STD risks.
* (uncountable, aviation) The angle by which an aircraft's nose is pointed upwind of its groundtrack to compensate for crosswinds during an approach to landing; its crab angle.
    The pilot had to hold fifteen degrees of crab during the approach to keep her plane from getting blown off the localizer course.
* (poker slang) A playing card with the rank of three.
* (rowing) A position in rowing where the oar is pushed under the rigger by the force of the water.
* A defect in an outwardly normal object that may render it inconvenient and troublesome to use.
** 1915, W.S. Maugham, “chapter 116”, in Of Human Bondage:-- "I suppose you wouldn't like to do a locum for a month on the South coast? Three guineas a week with board and lodging." -- "I wouldn't mind," said Philip. -- "It's at Farnley, in Dorsetshire. Doctor South. You'd have to go down at once; his assistant has developed mumps. I believe it's a very pleasant place." There was something in the secretary's manner that puzzled Philip. It was a little doubtful. -- "What's the crab in it?" he asked.
** 1940, Horace Annesley Vachell, Little Tyrannies‎:Arrested by the low price of another “desirable residence”, I asked “What's the crab?” The agent assured me that there was no crab. I fell in love with this house at sight. Happily, I discovered that it was reputed to be haunted.
* (dated) An unsold book that is returned to the publisher.
** 1844, Albert Henry Payne, Payne's universum, or pictorial world, page 99:[…] the unsold copies may be returned to the original publisher , at a period fixed upon between Christmas and Easter; these returned copies are technically called krebse or crabs, probably, from their walking backwards. […] A says to B, "I have had eight thousand dollars' worth of your publications, three thousand were crabs, that makes five thousand."
** 1892, The Publishers Weekly, volume 41, page 709:[…] unsold copies and settling the yearly accounts; while for the publisher begins the much dreaded season of "crabs," as […]

##### Derived terms

* Alaska crab, Alaska king crab, Alaskan king crab (Paralithodes spp, Lithodes aequispinus)
* anticrab
* applecrab
* arrow crab (Stenorhynchus seticornis)
* Asian blue crab
* Atlantic ghost crab
* black crab (Scylla serrata)
* black finger crab
* blue crab (Callinectes sapidus)
* blue swimmer crab (Portunus armatus)
* book-crab
* Boston crab
* box crab (Calappa spp.)
* brown box crab
* brown crab
* butterfly crab
* calling crab
* catch a crab
* chili crab
* chilli crab
* Chinese crab (Malus spp.)
* Chinese mitten crab (Eriocheir sinensis)
* Christmas Island red crab
* circular crab (Atelecyclus rotundatus)
* coconut crab (Birgus latro)
* come off crabs
* crab angle
* crabbed
* crabber
* crabbery
* crabbing
* crabbish
* crabble
* crab boil
* crab burger
* crabburger
* crabby
* crab cactus (Schlumbergera)
* crab cake
* crab canon, crab-canon
* crab-catcher
* crab claw
* crab-claw
* crabcore
* crab dolly
* crabeater
* crab-eater
* crab-eater seal
* crab-eating
* crab-eating fox
* crab-eating frog
* crab-eating macaque
* crab-eating raccoon
* crab-eating rat
* crab-eating zorro
* crab face, crab-face
* crab-faced
* crabfaced
* crab-farming
* crab-favored, crab-favoured
* crabfish
* crab-fish (Cancer major)
* crab football
* crab fork
* crab-grass, crabgrass (Digitaria spp.)
* crab-harrow
* crab-hole
* crabhole
* crab-holed
* crabless
* crablet
* crab-like, crablike
* crabling
* crab-lobster
* crab Louie
* crab Louis
* crab louse, crab-louse (Pthirus pubis)
* crab market
* crabmeat
* crab meat
* crab mentality
* Crab Nebula
* crabocado
* crabologist
* crab plover
* crab-pot
* crab-pot valve
* crab puff
* crab rangoon
* crab rock
* crab-roller
* crab's claw
* crab sex
* crab's eye, crab's-eye (Abrus precatorius)
* crab-shell
* crabshell
* crab-sidle
* crab-snouted
* crab soccer
* crab spider, crab-spider (Thomisidae spp.)
* crab-step
* crab stick
* crabstone
* crab-stone
* crabwalk
* crab-weed
* crabwise
* crab yaws
* crack crab
* cut a crab
* decorator crab
* decrab
* Diogenes crab
* Dolly Varden crab
* Dungeness crab (Metacarcinus magister)
* edible crab
* fast crab
* fiddler crab (Uca spp.)
* flower crab (Portunus pelagicus)
* gazami crab
* ghost crab (Ocypode)
* giant hermit crab
* giant mud crab
* glass-crab
* golden crab
* green crab (Carcinus maenas)
* Halloween crab (Gecarcinus quadratus)
* hard-shell crab
* hermit crab (Paguroidea spp.)
* Hoff crab
* horse crab
* horseshoe crab (Limulus spp.)
* Iowa crab
* Japanese crab
* Jonah crab (Cancer borealis)
* king crab, king-crab (Lithodidae spp.)
* lady crab (Ovalipes ocellatus)
* land crab, land-crab (Gecarcinidae spp.)
* mangrove crab (Scylla serrata)
* mantis crab (Squilla spp.)
* masked crab (Corystes cassivelaunus)
* mole crab (Hippoidea spp.)
* mouthless crab
* mud crab
* nobody crab, no-body crab (Pycnogonidae spp.)
* oyster crab (Zaops ostreus)
* paddyfields crab
* palm crab (Birgus latro)
* Parkman crab
* pea crab, pea-crab (Pinnotheres)
* pole-crab
* porcelain crab (Porcellanidae spp.)
* purse crab (Persephona spp.)
* purser's crabs
* pusser's crabs
* racing crab (Ocypodidae spp.)
* red crab
* reef crab
* river crab (Eriocheir sinensis)
* robber crab (Birgus latro)
* rock crab
* round crab (Atelecyclus rotundatus)
* rubble crab
* sand crab (Hippoidea spp.)
* scavenger crab
* sea crab
* sentinel crab (Macrophthalmus)
* shamefaced crab
* shame-faced crab (Calappa spp.)
* Shanghai hairy crab
* she-crab
* shellback crab
* shore crab, shore-crab (Carcinus maenas)
* sleepy crab
* snow crab
* soft-shell crab
* soldier crab, soldier-crab
* spanner crab
* spider crab, spider-crab (Majoidea spp.)
* sponge crab
* stilt crab (Palicidae spp.)
* stone crab (Menippe mercenaria et al.)
* strawberry crab (Neoliomera pubescens)
* swimming crab (Portunidae spp.)
* Tasmanian giant crab (Pseudocarcinus gigas)
* thinstripe hermit crab
* thumbnail crab (Thia scutellata)
* tree crab (Coenobita clypeatus)
* troll crab
* tuna crab
* turn out crabs
* vampire crab (Geosesarma spp.)
* velvet crab (Necora puber)
* werecrab
* white crab
* yellowline arrow crab

##### Translations
#### Verb

crab (third-person singular simple present crabs, present participle crabbing, simple past and past participle crabbed)
* (intransitive) To fish for crabs.
* (transitive, US, slang) To ruin.
** 1916, Ring W. Lardner, “Three Kings and a Pair”, in The Saturday Evening Post‎:I thought at the time that that little speech meant a savin' of eight dollars, […] But the Missus crabbed it a few minutes after her and Bess come in the room.
** 1940, Raymond Chandler, Farewell, My Lovely, Penguin, published 2010, page 224:‘Just so we understand each other,’ he said after a pause. ‘If you crab this case, you'll be in a jam.’
* (intransitive) To complain.
** 1925, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, chapter 7, in The Great Gatsby, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, published 1953, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 127:“The thing to do is to forget about the heat,” said Tom impatiently. “You make it ten times worse by crabbing about it.”
** 1981, Stephen King, Cujo, published 2001, page 163:And if we do have to walk, I don't want to have to listen to you crabbing at me, Tad Trenton.
* (transitive) To complain about.
** 2007, Douglas Newton, Dr. Odin, page 24:Well, because of this state of things they crabbed his scheme from the first, ridiculed it, wrote against it, spread broadcast a feeling of distrust.
* (intransitive) To drift or move sideways or to leeward (by analogy with the movement of a crab).
** 2000, Dana Stabenow, Midnight Come Again, →ISBN, page 251:Mutt stalked forward, matching him, step for step, crabbing sideways the way wolves do when they're going for the kill.
** 2007, Pat DePaolo, The Beijing Games, →ISBN, page 454:The aircraft crabbed sideways in the cross-winds and leveled to horizontal.
** 2015, Andrew Swanston, Waterloo: The Bravest Man, →ISBN:Another shouted order and again the squares crabbed sideways.
* To move in a manner that involves keeping low and clinging to surfaces.
** 2011, Robert Vivian, The Least Cricket of Evening, page 108:Time slowed down then, became liquid in the aftermath of his grotesque, unfolding limbs; he crabbed his way down the faded line, rocking back and forth in braces he would use all his life.
** 2019, Ronan Frost, White Peak:Foot by foot, he crabbed his way down another ninety feet of rock chimney until he stood on solid ground again, still very much alive.
* (transitive, aviation) To navigate (an aircraft, e.g. a glider) sideways against an air current in order to maintain a straight-line course.
* (transitive, film, television) To move (a camera) sideways.
** 1997, Paul Kriwaczek, Documentary for the Small Screen, page 109:If panning is not easy to make seem natural, crabbing the camera is even less like any action we perform with our eyes in the real world. There are a few circumstances in which we walk sideways: […]
* (obsolete, World War I), to fly slightly off the straight-line course towards an enemy aircraft, as the machine guns on early aircraft did not allow firing through the propeller disk.
* (rare) To back out of something.
** 1960, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, chapter XV, in Jeeves in the Offing, London: Herbert Jenkins, →OCLC:“Nothing can possibly go wrong.” “Just as you say, sir. But I still have that feeling.” The blood of the Woosters is hot, and I was about to tell him in set terms what I thought of his bally feeling, when I suddenly spotted what it was that was making him crab the act.

##### Derived terms

* crabber
* crabbing

### Etymology 2

From Middle English crabbe (“wild apple”), of Germanic origin, plausibly from North Germanic, cognate with Swedish dialect scrabba.

#### Noun

crab (plural crabs)
* The crab apple or wild apple.
** 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:I prithee, let me bring thee where crabs grow; And I with my long nails will dig thee pig-nuts;
** 1895, Robert Blatchford, “The New Party in the North”, in Andrew Reid, editor, The New Party Described by Some of its Members‎, London: Hodder Brothers, page 24:Just as by cultivation the acrid wild crab has been developed into the beautiful and luscious apple, may the unripe, ill-fed, neglected wild fruits of the fields and slums be developed into pure and noble and beautiful men and women.
* The tree bearing crab apples, which has a dogbane-like bitter bark with medical use.
* A cudgel made of the wood of the crab tree; a crabstick.
** 1741, David Garrick, The Lying Valet:She swore to such things , that I could do nothing but swear and call names : upon which out bolts her husband upon me , with a fine taper crab in his hand and fell upon me with such violence , that , being half delirious , I made a full confession
* A movable winch or windlass with powerful gearing, used with derricks, etc.
* A form of windlass, or geared capstan, for hauling ships into dock, etc.
* A machine used in ropewalks to stretch the yarn.
* A claw for anchoring a portable machine.

##### Synonyms

* (crab apple): crab apple
* (tree): crab apple

##### Derived terms

* cherry crab
* Chinese crab
* crab apple, crab-apple, crabapple
* crab-bat
* crab-knob
* crab-staff
* crab-stick, crabstick
* crab-stock
* crab-tree
* garland crab (Malus coronaria)
* Siberian crab (Malus baccata)

#### Verb

crab (third-person singular simple present crabs, present participle crabbing, simple past and past participle crabbed)
* (obsolete) To irritate, make surly or sour
* To be ill-tempered; to complain or find fault.
* (British dialect) To cudgel or beat, as with a crabstick
** 1639, John Fletcher, Monsieur Thomas:Get you to bed, drab, courage Or l'll so crab your shoulders!
** 1935, Jack Molyneux, John Fairfax-Blakeborough, Thirty Years a Hunt Servant: Being the Memories of Jack Molyneux, page 161:I was on a horse named The Skipper, a perfect terror to ride when he was in a bad humour, which he invariably was; nevertheless he was a splendid hunter and I never crabbed him.
** 2021, H. De Vere Stacpoole, Vanderdecken:The Shiremans had a down on him over stores he'd condemned as not fit for dogs, let alone able seamen, and they'd got wind he was a socialist, and they crabbed him all over the shipping companies' offices.

##### Derived terms

* crabber

### Etymology 3

Possibly a corruption of the genus name Carapa

#### Noun

crab (plural crabs)
* The tree species Carapa guianensis, native to South America.

##### Derived terms

* crab-nut
* crab oil

### Etymology 4

From carabiner.

#### Noun

crab (plural crabs)
* (informal) Short for carabiner.

### Further reading

* “crab”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
* crab on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
* Weisenberg, Michael (2000) The Official Dictionary of Poker. MGI/Mike Caro University. →ISBN
* Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of the English Language. International Edition. combined with Britannica World Language Dictionary. Chicago-London etc., Encyclopaedia Britannica, inc., 1965.

### Anagrams

* BRCA, CRBA, BCAR, BRAC, carb-, carb, cbar, RBAC

## Middle English
### Etymology 1

Inherited from Old English crabba.

#### Noun

crab
* Alternative form of crabbe (“crab”)

### Etymology 2

Of Germanic origin, plausibly from North Germanic.

#### Noun

crab
* Alternative form of crabbe (“crabapple”)

## Romanian
### Etymology

Borrowed from French crabe.

### Noun

crab m (plural crabi)
* crab

#### See also

* crevetă
* homar
* rac