skein
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: skān
ipa: /skeɪn/
rhymes: -eɪn
Forms: form: skeins
form: skean
form: skain
Etymology: From Middle English skayne, from Old French escaigne (Modern French écagne), probably of Proto-Celtic origin, from Proto-Indo-European *skend- (“to split off”). Compare Irish scáinne (“skein, clew”).
Senses: examples: text: Brau'd in mine owne houſe with a skeine of thred: / Away thou Ragge, thou quantitie, thou remnant,
ref: c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii], page 224:
text: No? why art thou then exaſperate, thou idle, / immateriall skiene of Sleyd ſilke; […]
ref: c. 1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], column 1:
text: “How horribly unjust of you!” cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of glossy white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the summer sky.
ref: 1891, Oscar Wilde, chapter 1, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.; Melbourne, Vic.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC:
text: The embroidery, which was a matter for thought, the design being difficult and the colours wanting consideration, brought lapses into the dialogue when she seemed to be engrossed in her skeins of silk, or, with head a little drawn back and eyes narrowed, considered the effect of the whole.
ref: 1915, Virginia Woolf, chapter XV, in The Voyage Out, London: Duckworth & Co., […], →OCLC:
text: “He did have a beard, sir,” replied Dorcas, smiling. “And well I know it, for he borrowed two skeins of my black wool to make it with! And I’m sure it looked wonderfully natural at a distance.”
ref: 1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 115:
text: You hold the skein: wind, Thomas, wind / The thread of eternal life and death.
ref: 1935, T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral, Part I:
coordinate_terms: hank
glosses: A quantity of yarn, thread, etc. put up together in an oblong shape, after it is taken from the reel. A skein of cotton yarn is formed by eighty turns of the thread around a fifty-four inch reel.
examples: text: He watched her pretty and unconscious munching through the skeins of smoke that pervaded the tent[…]
ref: 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC:
text: But when she turned her thoughts to Morningside Park she perceived the tangled skein of life was now to be further complicated by his romantic importunity.
ref: 1909, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter 13, in Ann Veronica, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, page 289:
text: The practical application of what I have said is very close to the problem which I am investigating. It is a tangled skein, you understand, and I am looking for a loose end.
ref: 1923, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Creeping Man:
text: But then, science is a complex skein, intricately interknotted across the artificial boundaries we draw only that we may the more easily encompass its parts in our mind. Pick up any thread of that skein and the whole structure will follow.
ref: 1964, Issac Asimov, Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology:
text: Then, beginning in 1959, the skein of convention began to unravel.
ref: 2005, Tony Judt, “The Social Democratic Moment”, in Postwar: A history of Europe since 1945, London: Vintage Books, published 2010, →ISBN:
text: Ted began to walk, still dazed, until he found himself among a skein of backstreets so narrow they felt dark.
ref: 2010, Jennifer Egan, “Goodbye, My Love”, in A Visit from the Goon Squad:
text: It was the latest in a skein of legal maneuvers by the prince’s lawyers to defuse Ms. Giuffre’s case.
ref: 2022 January 4, Mark Landler, “Prince Andrew’s Uncertain Legal Fate Casts Shadow on Britain’s Royals”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
glosses: A web, a weave, a tangle.
topics: biology
natural-sciences
zoology
glosses: The membrane of a fish ovary.
examples: text: One of the free-state settlers went to the blacksmith's shop unarmed, carrying a waggon skein to be repaired.
ref: 1862, T. Hughes, History of the US:
topics: arts
crafts
hobbies
lifestyle
wagonmaking
glosses: A metallic strengthening band or thimble on the wooden arm of an axle.
examples: text: High above the swallows and 2 miles or so out into the Channel was a skein of geese, probably brent geese on the first day of their emigration from the estuaries of the Channel coast towards the high Arctic tundra of Spitsbergen or Russia.
ref: 2018, Laurence Rose, The Long Spring, Bloomsbury, →ISBN, page 111:
text: They're only referred to as a gaggle when they're on land. When they're flying in formation they can be referred to as a skein.
ref: 2019 June 6, “A gaggle, a confusion and a conspiracy - bizarre animal collective group names”, in BBC:
topics: biology
natural-sciences
zoology
coordinate_terms: gaggle
wedge
glosses: A group of wild fowl (e.g. geese, goslings) when they are in flight.
topics: hobbies
lifestyle
sports
glosses: A winning streak.
examples: text: All three tele skeins are pitching furiously to snag the super Easter Day tele show to be bankrolled by Frigidaire, […]
ref: 1950, Billboard, volume 62, number 9:
text: Three comedy shows from the U. S. are in the CTV lineup: CBSTV's Phil Silvers and Danny Thomas skeins and NBC-TV's "Harry's Girls."
ref: 1963, Radio Television Daily, volume 93, page 5:
topics: broadcasting
media
radio
television
glosses: A series created by a web (major broadcasting network).