- a variation of rhyme.
rime
1 Americannoun
verb (used with object)
-
rimes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
rimed,
past participle, past
-
riming
present participle
noun
noun
verb
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
rimesimple
-
rimessimple
-
have rimedperfect
-
has rimedperfect
-
am rimingprogressive
-
are rimingprogressive
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is rimingprogressive
-
have been rimingperfect progressive
-
has been rimingperfect progressive
Past
-
rimedsimple
-
had rimedperfect
-
was rimingprogressive
-
were rimingprogressive
-
had been rimingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of rime
before 900; Middle English rim, Old English hrīm; cognate with Dutch rijm, Old Norse hrīm
Explanation
Rime is a type of ice that forms when the moisture in fog freezes suddenly on an object. The white frost that forms on trees along mountain ridges is rime. Rime can cause trouble for aircraft, as it also forms when a cloud's water droplets freeze to a surface, like the metal body of an airplane. Another, completely different, meaning of this word is "rhyme." It's simply an old-fashioned way to refer to the ending sounds of two words that sound alike — like "mouse" and "house." And "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is just a very long, very old, rhyming poem.
Vocabulary lists containing rime
"Once Upon a Time," Vocabulary from the short story
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Heir
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Inferno
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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:
At the rime, Qantas said it had agreed to pay the fine and that the ruling holds it accountable for actions that caused "real harm" to its employees.
From BBC ● Mar. 12, 2026
Crisp, opaque rime — now doesn’t that roll trippingly off the tongue?
From Washington Post ● Apr. 8, 2022
Standing around amid the fumaroles, bison are sheeted with a hundred pounds of rime and icicles.
From Salon ● Apr. 21, 2019
We used to call these “family words” when I was a kid: rat, bat, cat, mat, etc., all have the “-at” rime with different consonant onsets.
From Slate ● Nov. 29, 2018
There had been a rime, Theresa remembered, when Helen had held the paper gingerly, to avoid getting her hands full of news-print.
From "Typical American" by Gish Jen
If the riming is particularly intense, the rimed snow crystal can grow to an appreciable size, but remain less than 0.2 inches.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 24, 2023
On the beach the sand was frozen in crusts and rimed with frost.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 23, 2021
Pine needles grow their own ice needles, turning into rimed maces.
From Scientific American ● Nov. 18, 2019
The air was deadly cold; spicules of ice rimed the oldtimer's whiskers.
From Time Magazine Archive
From the deep freeze he fetched rimed cartons of beans and strawberries, twenty years old.
From "The Martian Chronicles" by Ray Bradbury
If the riming is particularly intense, the rimed snow crystal can grow to an appreciable size, but remain less than 0.2 inches.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 24, 2023
Others there are that have no composition at all; but a kind of tuning and riming fall in what they write.
From The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I by Francis W. (Francis Whiting) Halsey
Most critics prefer those forms of sestet which avoid a final riming couplet.
From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden
Full rime, or end-rime, involves the principally stressed vowel in the riming word, and all that follows that vowel.
From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden
The rimes in all the stanzas must be identical in the corresponding lines, but the riming words must be different.
From English Verse Specimens Illustrating its Principles and History by Raymond MacDonald Alden
We've our business to attend Day's duties, bend back the bow in dreams as we may till the end rimes in the taut string with the sending.
From Time Magazine Archive
For half a heartbeat the rimes graven on the gold bands seemed to shimmer in the air.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
"His armor is bronze, thousands and thousands of years old, engraved with magic rimes that ward him against harm," she whis-pered to Jeyne.
From "A Game of Thrones" by George R.R. Martin
That huge horn with its bands of old gold, incised with ancient rimes ... had Mance Rayder lied to him, or was Tormund lying now?
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
Here the first two lines represent a corrupt type of the same lines in verse 3 of the B version, while the rimes wroght : nought recall verse 1.
From Erthe Upon Erthe by Various
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.
