crib
/kɹɪb/ noun, verb
Forms cribs cribbing cribbed
- noun (US) A baby’s bed with high, often slatted, often moveable sides, suitable for a child who has outgrown a cradle or bassinet.
- noun (UK) A bed for a child older than a baby.
- noun (nautical) A small sleeping berth in a packet or other small vessel.
- noun A wicker basket.
- noun A manger, a feeding trough for animals elevated off the earth or floor, especially one for fodder such as hay.
- noun The baby Jesus and the manger in a creche or nativity scene, consisting of statues of Mary, Joseph and various other characters such as the magi.
- noun A bin for drying or storing grain, such as a corn crib.
- noun A small room or covered structure, especially one of rough construction, used for storage or penning animals.
- verb (transitive) To place or confine in a crib.
- verb To shut up or confine in a narrow habitation; to cage; to cramp.
- verb (transitive) To collect one or more passages and/or references for use in a speech, written document or as an aid for some task; to create a crib sheet. “I cribbed the recipe from the Food Network site, but made a few changes of my own.”
- verb (transitive, informal) To plagiarize; to copy; to cheat.
- verb (intransitive) To install timber supports, as with cribbing.
- verb (transitive, archaic) To steal or embezzle.
- verb (India) To complain, to grumble
- verb To crowd together, or to be confined, as if in a crib or in narrow accommodations.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English crib, cribbe, from Old English crib, cryb, cribb, crybb (“couch, bed; manger, stall”), from Proto-West Germanic *kribbjā, from Proto-Germanic *kribjǭ (“crib, wickerwork”), from Proto-Indo-European *grebʰ-, *gerbʰ- (“bunch, bundle, tuft, clump”), from *ger- (“to turn, twist”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Kräbbe, Krääb, Krääf (“crib”), West Frisian krêbe (“crib”), Dutch krib (“crib, manger”), German Krippe (“rack, crib”), Danish krybbe (“crib”), Icelandic krubba (“crib”). Doublet of crèche. The sense of ‘stealing, taking notes, plagiarize’ seems to have developed out of the verb.
The criminal sense may derive from the 'basket' sense, circa the mid 18th century, in that a poacher could conceal poachings in such a basket (see the 1772 Samuel Foote quotation). The cheating sense probably derives from the criminal sense.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A manger or rack; a feeding place for animals.
- noun A stall for oxen or other cattle.
- verb To shut up or confine in a narrow habitation; to cage; to cramp.
- verb To pilfer or purloin; hence, to steal from an author; to appropriate; to plagiarize; as, to crib a line from Milton. [Colloq.]
Etymology [AS. crybb; akin to OS. kribbja, D. krib, kribbe, Dan. krybbe, G. krippe, and perh. to MHG. krebe basket, G, korb, and E. rip a sort of wicker basket.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “crib”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details