stab – English noun declension

English noun forms of stab

Noun: stab
Singularstab
Pluralstabs

Sample Sentences

  • A knife was flashing in his hand, and just as he was about to take a stab at me, the smith grabbed his arm from behind. [1979, Karl May, The Secret Brotherhood: A Novel, Seabury Press, →ISBN, page 52:]
  • I opened the man's linen robe, and there over his heart was a dagger-wound, and beneath the woman's fair breast was a like cruel stab, through which her life had ebbed away. [1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:]
  • “I bet you two have really big plans. And might I say, that is just fab,” he said of Lynn's dress. “I'm glad someone noticed,” she replied, seeming to take a stab at me. [2001, Van Whitfield, Guys in Suits: A Novel, Doubleday, →ISBN, page 73:]
  • I'll give this thankless task a stab.
  • As yet, we don't know what the comparable figures will be like for the current financial year which ends in March 2022, but we can have a good stab at approximating them. [2022 January 12, Sir Michael Holden, “Reform of the workforce or death by a thousand cuts?”, in RAIL, number 948, page 22:]
  • a horn stab

Etymology

1. First attested in Scottish English (compare Scots stob, stobbe, stabb (“a pointed stick or stake; a thrust with a pointed weapon”)), from Middle English stabbe (“a stab”), probably a variant of Middle English stob, stub, stubbe (“pointed stick, stake, thorn, stub, stump”), from Old Norse stobbi, stubbi, cognate with Old English stybb. Cognate with Middle Dutch stobbe.
2. Supposed by some to derive from Scottish Gaelic stob (“to prick, to prod, to push, to thrust”); supposed by others to be from a Scots word. See: Middle English Nouns 'stabbe', Old Norse Nouns 'stobbi', Old English Nouns 'stybb'.