Scab

/skæb/ · noun

Meaning

An incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed during healing..

Definitions by Sense

1. An incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed during healing.
2. (colloquial or obsolete) The scabies.
3. The mange, especially when it appears on sheep.
4. (uncountable) Any of several different diseases of potatoes producing pits and other damage on their surface, caused by streptomyces bacteria (but formerly believed to be caused by a fungus).
5. Common scab, a relatively harmless variety of scab (potato disease) caused by Streptomyces scabies.
6. (phytopathology) Any one of various more or less destructive fungal diseases that attack cultivated plants, forming dark-colored crustlike spots.
7. (founding) A slight irregular protuberance which defaces the surface of a casting, caused by the breaking away of a part of the mold.
8. A mean, dirty, paltry fellow.

Example Sentences

Scab was the terror of the sheep farmer, and the peril of his calling.

Out, scab!

I would make thee the / loathsomest scab in Greece.

When a scab comes down the street, men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out.

1734, Royal Society of London, The Philosophical Transactions (1719 - 1733) Abridged, Volume 7, page 631, Thoſe Puſtules aroſe, maturated, and ſcabbed off, intirely like the true Pox.

Trev walked over and leaned down, dropping a tender kiss on her forehead where the skin was raw and scabbing from the cut.

The bark that wasn′t already scabbed off was peppered with beetle holes.

The beds shall be scabbed off to give a solid bearing, no pinning shall be admitted between the backing and the face stones and there shall be a good square joint not exceeding one inch in width, and the face stone shall be scabbed off to allow this.

Synonyms for scab

Antonyms for scab

Related Words

Word Forms

• scabs
• scabbing
• scabbed

Usage Notes

Choose a synonym only when it preserves the intended meaning, tone, and grammar of the full sentence.

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