different between stab vs stabs

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: st?b, IPA^(key): /stæb/
• Hyphenation: stab
• Rhymes: -æb

Etymology 1

First attested in Scottish English (compare Scots stob, stobbe, stabb (“a pointed stick or stake; a thrust with a pointed weapon”)), from Middle English stabbe (“a stab”), probably a variant of Middle English stob, stub, stubbe (“pointed stick, stake, thorn, stub, stump”), from Old Norse stobbi, stubbi, cognate with Old English stybb. Cognate with Middle Dutch stobbe.

Supposed by some to derive from Scottish Gaelic stob (“to prick, to prod, to push, to thrust”); supposed by others to be from a Scots word.

Noun

stab (plural stabs)

1. An act of stabbing or thrusting with an object.
2. A wound made by stabbing.
3. Pain inflicted on a person's feelings.
4. (informal) An attempt.

   I'll give this thankless task a stab.

5. Criticism.
6. (music) A single staccato chord that adds dramatic impact to a composition.

   a horn stab

7. A bacterial culture made by inoculating a solid medium, such as gelatin, with the puncture of a needle or wire.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

stab (third-person singular simple present stabs, present participle stabbing, simple past and past participle stabbed)

1. (transitive) To pierce or to wound (somebody) with a pointed tool or weapon, especially a knife or dagger.

2. (transitive) To thrust in a stabbing motion.

3. (intransitive) To recklessly hit with the tip of a pointed object, such as a weapon or finger (often used with at).

   • None shall dare / With shortened sword to stab in closer war.

4. (intransitive) To cause a sharp, painful sensation (often used with at).

5. (transitive, figuratively) To injure secretly or by malicious falsehood or slander.

6. (transitive) To roughen a brick wall with a pick so as to hold plaster.
7. (transitive) To pierce folded sheets, near their back edges, for the passage of thread or wire.

Derived terms

• stabbee
• stabber

Translations

References

• stab in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• stab at OneLook Dictionary Search

Etymology 2

Clipping of stabilizer or stabiliser.

Noun

stab (plural stabs)

1. (aviation, slang) The horizontal or vertical stabilizer of an aircraft.

Etymology 3

Adjective

stab (not comparable)

1. (industrial relations) Clipping of established.
   • 1893, Proceedings of the Parliament of South Australia (page 313)

     Do you know whether any country offices pay their men by the thousand, or whether they are on stab wages? — I do not know. Some are paid stab wages, but I do not know whether there is much piece-work.

   • 1967, John Child, Industrial Relations in the British Printing Industry (page 113)

     The pressmen were granted a stab wage of 36s for a 60 hour week, and the extras for overtime and Sunday work […]

Noun

stab (plural not attested)

1. (industrial relations) Clipping of establishment.
   • 1892, The British Printer (volume 5, page 42)

     […] there were 286 overseers and 210 readers occupied in the 501 offices; 2,691 compositors were paid on the stab […]

Anagrams

• ABTs, ATBs, ATSB, Bast, Bats, SATB, TBAs, TBSA, Tabs, bast, bats, tabs

Danish

Etymology

From German Stab.

Noun

stab c (singular definite staben, plural indefinite stabe)

1. staff

Inflection

Lushootseed

Etymology

Proto-Salish *s-tam ("what?"; "something"), from *s- +? *tam (“thing; what”)

Determiner

stab

1. what (interrogative pronoun)
2. thing

Swedish

Etymology

From German Stab.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /st??b/

Noun

stab c

1. a staff

Declension

References

Anagrams

• bast

English

Pronunciation

Noun

stabs

1. plural of stab

Verb

stabs

1. Third-person singular simple present indicative form of stab

Anagrams

• basts

Danish

Noun

stabs c

1. indefinite genitive singular of stab

Latvian

Etymology

From Proto-Baltic *steb-, *stab- (with -as), from Proto-Indo-European *steb?- (“post, pole, (tree) trunk; to support, to hold, to pound, to tread”). Cognates include Lithuanian stãbas (“idol, statue; pole; shape; paralysis; surrouding; respite, breathing space”), Old Prussian stabis (“rock, stone”), stabni (“oven”) (< *stabin?), Old Church Slavonic ??????? (stobor?, “column”), Bulgarian ??????? (stobór, “wooden fence”), Slovene stebér (“pole, idol”), Old Norse stafr (“stick, rod, support”), Old High German stab, Middle Low German staf, German Stab (“stick, rod, club”), English staff, Sanskrit ????????? (stabhn??ti, “to support, to strengthen”), Ancient Greek ?????? (stémb?, “to pound, to shake continuously”).

Pronunciation

Noun

stabs m (1st declension)

1. pole, post, pillar (vertically placed long, thin, cylindrical object to keep something in place)

2. (figuratively) column, pillar (a volatile substance rising upright in the air)

3. column (part of a thermometer or barometer: a thin tube filled with a liquid substance, usually mercury)

Declension

Derived terms

• burtstabi?š
• stabi?š

References

Swedish

Noun

stabs

1. indefinite genitive singular of stab