rub – English noun declension

English noun forms of rub

Noun: rub
Singularrub
Pluralrubs

Sample Sentences

  • Give that lamp a good rub and see if any genies come out.
  • To die, to sleep— / To sleep—perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub! / For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, / When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, / Must give us pause [c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene i]:]
  • […] the propriety of the cabman's shelter, as it was called, hardly a stonesthrow away near Butt bridge where they might hit upon some drinkables in the shape of a milk and soda or a mineral. But how to get there was the rub. [1922 February, James Joyce, “[[Episode 16]]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:]
  • 'My dear Devereux, I say, you mustn't talk in that wild way. You—you talk like a ruined man!'
  • 'And I so comfortable!'
  • 'Why, to be sure, Dick, you have had some little rubs, and, maybe, your follies and your vexations; but, hang it, you are young; you can't get experience—at least, so I've found it—without paying for it. […]' [1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard:]
  • a heat rub intended for muscular strains

Etymology

1. Inherited from Middle English rubben, of unknown origin; possibly ultimately from Proto-Germanic *rubbōną, related to *reufaną (“to tear”).
2. Cognate with Saterland Frisian rubje (“to rub, scrape”), German Low German rubben (“to rub”), Low German rubblig (“rough, uneven”), Dutch robben, rubben (“to rub smooth; scrape; scrub”), Danish rubbe (“to rub, scrub”), Icelandic and Norwegian rubba (“to scrape”).
3. More at reave.
4. Compare typologically Latin fricō < friō < Proto-Indo-European *bʰreyH- (whence also Russian брить (britʹ, “to shave”)).

Verbs referencing "rub"

Dutch Nouns rob, German Nouns Robbe.