snub

snub¹ rebuke, slight

Etymology

The word for rebuking is inherited from Middle English snubben,^[2][3][4][5] borrowed from Old Norse snubba (“to scold, chide, rebuke”),^{[6][7][3][4][5][8][9]} which is recorded in that sense.^[6] Its relatives Danish snubbe and dialectal Swedish snubba also mean to cut short or make stumpy,^[6][9][10] and Etymonline compares snubbotr (“nipped, with the tip cut off”).^[7] Etymonline and Klein therefore take the original sense to be "to cut off, nip off",^[7][5] and Weekley the ground sense "to shorten", as in the snub nose.^[11] Merriam-Webster Unabridged links it with Middle Low German snubbelen (“to chide”) and perhaps with Old High German snabul (“beak”),^[12] and Dictionary.com with Middle Low German snūben;^[4] Hoad calls the Norse verb of unknown origin,^[13] and Partridge compares snout.^[14] Middle English also had snibben, to rebuke, from before 1250,^[15][16] also from Scandinavian,^[7][16] which Chaucer used;^[17] Partridge takes it for a thinned form of snubben and the source of snib.^[14] The adjective of the nose comes from the verb in the sense "to cut short", first in snub nose (1724) and snub-nosed (1725).^[6][15][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

To check, reprove or rebuke sharply: before 1340, in Richard Rolle's Psalter.^[6] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the verb to the 13th century,^[12] and Barnhart traces it to snibben (probably before 1250), with snubben from about 1340.^[15]

Semantic evolution

From rebuking, the verb moved to checking or restraining a thing (1583–1688), to cutting short or nipping off the end of something (1615) and to making snub-nosed (1796).^[6][15] Johnson (1755) defined it as "to check; to reprimand" and "to nip", quoting Ray on trees "snubbed by the winds".^[18] Trench (1859) noted that the verb, once used literally for checking or cutting short, then survived only in a figurative sense and in familiar speech.^[19] The modern sense, to treat someone coldly or with contempt, appeared in the 18th century.^[15][7] The sense of checking survives in sailors' and American use: from 1841 a running rope or a boat was snubbed when it was stopped suddenly, as by a turn of rope round a post,^[6][11][13] and the noun meant such a check or the post itself from 1891.^[6] The noun, a rebuke or slight, followed the verb from before 1556,^[6][7][15] and Middle English had a noun snibbe in the same sense from about 1350.^[15] In the dialects of Durham, the Lake District, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Suffolk snub still meant to reprimand or chastise.^[20] In the 20th century snub became a term of geometry for certain polyhedra (1934),^[6] and snubs! a slang interjection of indifference (1934).^[6][9] In American slang a snub is a snub-nosed handgun.^[21][6]

Timeline

• before 1340 – to check or rebuke sharply.^[6]
• before 1556 – noun, a rebuke or check.^[6] Etymonline dates the noun to the 1530s and Barnhart to 1537.^[7][15]
• 1583 – to check or restrain a thing (obsolete by 1688).^[6]
• 1590 – noun, a snag or stub, in Spenser's Faerie Queene.^[6][18]
• 1615 – to cut short, or to nip off the end of a thing.^[6][15]
• 1724 – snub nose, a short nose turned up at the tip.^[6][15][12]
• 1841 – to stop a running rope or a boat suddenly.^[6]
• 1843 – adjective, of the nose, short and turned up.^[6]
• 1891 – noun, a sudden check given to a running rope; a post for doing this.^[6]
• 1934 – adjective in geometry, of certain polyhedra; also snubs!, an interjection of contempt.^[6]
• 1979 – a snub-nosed handgun.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To treat someone with deliberate coldness or contempt; to slight or ignore on purpose: The minister snubbed the reporters waiting at the gate.^[10][12][9]
2. To check or rebuke someone with a cutting remark.^[12][6]
3. To stop a running rope, or a boat or horse, suddenly, especially by taking a turn of rope round a post.^[10][6][9]
4. (rare) To cut short, or to check the growth of.^[6][13]
5. (archaic) To scold.^[12][6]

Noun

1. A deliberate rebuff or slight.^[10][12][9]
2. A sudden check given to a running rope; a snubbing post.^[6][12][9]
3. (nautical) An elastic shock absorber fitted to a mooring line.^[10]

Adjective

1. Of the nose, short and turned up at the tip; snub-nosed.^[6][12][9]
2. Short and blunt; stubby.^[10][12]

Word family

• snubber
• snubness
• snubbingly
• snub-nosed
• unsnubbed

snub² sob

Etymology

The word for sobbing is probably imitative of the sound of crying, like sob.^[6] Merriam-Webster Unabridged and the Shorter Oxford take it as a variant of the dialect verb snob (“to sob”),^[12][9] and the Middle English Dictionary records the Middle English verb snobben, to sob, as probably imitative, perhaps formed on sobben.^[16] Johnson (1755) derived it from Dutch.^[18]

Earliest recorded meaning

To cry noisily, taking loud gasping breaths: about 1335, in a poem of the Kildare manuscript.^[6][16]

Semantic evolution

Johnson (1755) entered it as "to sob with convulsion".^[18] The noun, a sob, is recorded from 1562 to 1737.^[6] The Shorter Oxford calls the verb rare and now dialectal and American,^[9] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged labels it chiefly Midland.^[12] Wright found it in Worcestershire and in American use, quoting Scribner's Monthly of 1880.^[20]

Timeline

• c. 1335 – to sob, to cry noisily.^[6][16]
• 1562 – noun, a sob (obsolete by 1737).^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. (dialect) To sob.^[12][9][20]

Noun

1. (dialect) A sob.^[12][6]