REAVE (reft)

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

Irregular inflected form: reft   

 Dictionary entry overview: What does reave mean? 

• REAVE (verb)
  The verb REAVE has 1 sense:

1. steal goods; take as spoils

  Familiarity information: REAVE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• REAVE (verb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Steal goods; take as spoils

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Synonyms:

despoil; foray; loot; pillage; plunder; ransack; reave; rifle; strip

Context example:

During the earthquake people looted the stores that were deserted by their owners

Hypernyms (to "reave" is one way to...):

take (take by force)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "reave"):

deplume; displume (strip of honors, possessions, or attributes)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

 Context examples 

And then, as half the crowd strained to the left and half to the right to avoid the pressure from behind, the vast mass was suddenly reft in twain, and through the gap surged the rough fellows from behind, all armed with loaded sticks and yelling for Fair play and Gloucester!

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

For the doom which had reft me from adhesion to my master: for him I was no more to see; for the desperate grief and fatal fury—consequences of my departure—which might now, perhaps, be dragging him from the path of right, too far to leave hope of ultimate restoration thither.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)