lave
1 Americanverb (used with object)
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to wash; bathe.
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(of a river, sea, etc.) to flow along, against, or past; wash.
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Obsolete. to ladle; pour or dip with a ladle.
verb (used without object)
noun
adjective
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of lave1
First recorded before 900; Middle English laven “to wash, bathe, moisten,” partly from Old French laver, from Latin lavāre “to wash, bathe”; partly from Old English lafian “to pour water on, wash,” gelafian “to wash, lave, refresh,” itself perhaps from Latin lavāre
Origin of lave2
First recorded before 1000; Middle English love, lave, loave, Old English lāf “remnant, remains”; cognate with Old High German leiba, Old Norse leif, Gothic laiba; akin to leave 1
Origin of lave3
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English; special use of lave 1
Vocabulary lists containing lave
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
In 2023 it brokered a deal between bitter rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran, which lave long stood on opposing sides in proxy wars in the Middle East.
From BBC ● Apr. 1, 2026
The eruption eased pressure that had been building under a lave dome perched on the crater.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 5, 2021
Khalid Thomas, Elias Valtonen and walk-on Kyle Feit all played sporadically, but their transfers lave Hurley with a thin roster, particularly if White and Martin don’t return.
From Washington Times ● Apr. 1, 2020
I lave extremely acute hearing and vision, plus a sense of smell extraordinarily dis criminating ...
From Time Magazine Archive
Despite the fact that I hated hem, Denna’s men taught me a lesson that I might never lave learned otherwise.
From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss
Back at the Aiden house, the Shabbat dinner guests have all laved their hands with a glass of water and returned to the sun deck for matzo-ball soup.
From Nature ● Jun. 22, 2011
Pyro glosses over its terror with a sort of Hitchcock-and-bull story photographed in Spain in flamenco hues and laved in bucketfuls of blue butane gas.
From Time Magazine Archive
The moon, the slender candles, the eternal flame at John's memorial—47 feet away and the floodlights laved Robert Kennedy's resting place beneath a magnolia tree.
From Time Magazine Archive
Catherine the Great, Jonathan Swift, John Wesley and a score of other 18th century movers and shapers are laved more in the warm glow of idiosyncrasy than in the cold light of 100% accuracy.
From Time Magazine Archive
Once more Aragorn bruised two leaves of athelas and cast them into steaming water; and he laved her brow with it, and her right arm lying cold and nerveless on the coverlet.
From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien
"Sit down, Denis, sit down—don't be laving your company such a night as this."
From The Macdermots of Ballycloran by Trollope, Anthony
I looked across the "beautiful river," and beheld the hills of my native State coming down to the water's edge, and laving their feet in the cooling waves.
From Project Gutenberg book of Historical Romance of the American Negro by Fowler, Charles H.
Grandson!" grunted Tom, heaving up, "I've got no grandson, or he wouldn't be laving me to smoke a dry pipe.
From The Manxman A Novel - 1895 by Caine, Hall, Sir
The Russians followed the same system they afterward employed against the French, retiring and laving waste the country.
From Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 A series of pen and pencil sketches of the lives of more than 200 of the most prominent personages in History by Horne, Charles F. (Charles Francis)
The laving of all moveable property, and the aspersion of all immoveable, recommenced.
From Flower, Fruit, and Thorn Pieces; or, the Wedded Life, Death, and Marriage of Firmian Stanislaus Siebenkaes, Parish Advocate in the Burgh of Kuhschnappel. by Jean Paul
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
