shiv en · NOUN
Pronunciation
Etymology
First attested 1915. From chive, chieve, chife, chiv (“knife”), from Romani chive, chiv, chivvomengro (“knife, dagger, blade”).
Meanings
-
(countable, slang) A knife, especially a makeshift one fashioned from something not normally used as a weapon (like a plastic spoon or a toothbrush).
Mr. Simpson finished “If I Did It” with the help of a ghostwriter, but after a public outcry, the book was shelved, and the woman who had agreed to publish it lost her job. “Basically, I got the shiv,” Ms. Regan said in a phone interview this week.
2024 April 13, Jacob Bernstein, quoting Judith Regan, “When O.J. Simpson ‘Confessed’ to Murder”, in The New York Times:It's perhaps fitting that I write this introduction in jail—that graduate school of survival. Here you learn how to use toothpaste as glue, fashion a shiv out of a spoon and build intricate communication networks.
1971, Abbie Hoffman, “Introduction”, in Steal This Book, Pirate Editions / Grove Press:
- (uncountable) A particular woody by-product of processing flax or hemp.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| chiv | Geordie, Scotland, alternative | lexicographic | |
| shive | alternative | lexicographic | |
| shivs | Number=Plur | lexicographic | |
| chib | Geordie, Scotland, alternative | lexicographic |
Deriveds
Synonyms
Translations (7)
es pincho (knife) · nl mes (knife) · es chuzo (knife) · ru зато́чка (knife) · fr surin (knife) · fi omatekoinen veitsi (knife) · pt estoque (knife)