ROVE • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Rove

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/roʊv/ Listen

verb

Rove v. t.

1.

To draw through an eye or aperture.

2.

To draw out into flakes; to card, as wool.

3.

To twist slightly; to bring together, as slivers of wool or cotton, and twist slightly before spinning.

Rove v. t.

1.

To wander over or through. "Roving the field, I chanced A goodly tree far distant to behold."

2.

To plow into ridges by turning the earth of two furrows together.

Rove v. i. (past & past part. roved; pres. part. roving)

1.

To practice robbery on the seas; to wander about on the seas in piracy. (Obs.)

2.

Hence, to wander; to ramble; to rauge; to go, move, or pass without certain direction in any manner, by sailing, walking, riding, flying, or otherwise. "For who has power to walk has power to rove."

3.

(Archery) To shoot at rovers; hence, to shoot at an angle of elevation, not at point-blank (rovers usually being beyond the point-blank range). "Fair Venus' son, that with thy cruel dart At that good knight so cunningly didst rove."

Synonyms: To wander; roam; range; ramble stroll.

noun

Rove n.

1.

A copper washer upon which the end of a nail is clinched in boat building.

2.

A roll or sliver of wool or cotton drawn out and slighty twisted, preparatory to further process; a roving.

Rove n. The act of wandering; a ramble. "In thy nocturnal rove one moment halt."

Rove beetle (Zool.), any one of numerous species of beetles of the family Staphylinidae, having short elytra beneath which the wings are folded transversely. They are rapid runners, and seldom fly.

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Etymology of 'Rove'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Rove" Quotes from Famous Books

... seem to be in opposition to a prevailing impression derived from the fact that frigates are constantly mentioned as being "on a cruise." The assumption is that they in effect patrolled the great routes. But this was not so, nor did they rove the sea at will. They constituted a definite and necessary part of the system. Though that system was founded on a distinction between defended terminals and undefended routes, which was a real strategical ...

— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett

... the conning-tower there was a steel flagstaff about ten feet high, with halliards rove through a sheer in the top. He took a little roll of bunting out of a locker under the desk, opened a glass slide, brought in the halliards and ...

— A Honeymoon in Space • George Griffith

... taking off the blubber is called. The coopers had meantime been getting ready the large caldrons for boiling the blubber; which operation is called "trying-out." A rope passed round the windlass, and rove through a block fast to the head of the mainmast, was carried over the side, with a large hook at the end of it. The first thing done was to cut off the head of the whale, which, with the neck-part up, was ...

— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... in the wave is a coral grove, Where the purple mullet and gold fish rove, Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blues, That never are wet with falling dew, But in bright and changeful beauty shine, Far down in the green ...

— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper

... and unmentionable—board them, as it were, in the piratical sense, making them bleed terribly, and giving no quarter. Down by the Docks, the seamen roam in mid-street and mid-day, their pockets inside out, and their heads no better. Down by the Docks, the daughters of wave-ruling Britannia also rove, clad in silken attire, with uncovered tresses streaming in the breeze, bandanna kerchiefs floating from their shoulders, and crinoline not wanting. Down by the Docks, you may hear the Incomparable Joe Jackson sing the Standard of England, with a hornpipe, any night; or any ...

— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens

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