▪ I. rab n.
var. *rav n.
▪ II. rab1
(ræb)
[ad. F. rabot in same sense; cf. rabbit n.3]
A wooden beater, formed like a crutch, used for mixing the ingredients of mortar.
| a 1825 Forby Voc. E. Anglia. 1860 Worcester cites Leonard. 1875 Knight Dict. Mech. 1850/1. |
▪ III. rab2
dial. = rad n.2 (q.v.).
| 1830 Loudon Cottage Arch. §840 Cob is used for filling in the framework, which is previously lathed with stout slit oak... This sort of work is called rab and dab. |
▪ IV. rab3 Chiefly Cornish (orig. dial.).
[Shortened f. Cornish rabman, -men in the same sense. Ultimate origin obscure. Also recorded from Wales (quot. 1910).
There is no apparent connection with Scottish and Northumberland dial. raab, rab (the fall of a cliff, a mass of broken rock, etc.), which is of Scandinavian origin (see e.g. S.N.D.).]
Rough or stony subsoil; rubble, gravel.
| [1769 W. Borlase Antiquities Cornwall 452/1 Rabman, rubble; that mixture of clay and stone which has not been moved since the flood, and generally lies over the karn. 1868 Proc. Soc. Antiquaries London IV. 164 The floor..is composed of the hard subsoil of the country, called by the Cornish ‘rabman’.] 1880 Courtney & Couch Gloss. Words Cornwall 46/1 Rab, decomposed granite used for mending roads. 1910 W. M. Morris Gloss. Demetian Dial., Rab, rough, stony soil; sub-soil. 1912 Antiquity XXVI. 90 The site of the hut was cleared and levelled by cutting back into the hillside and spreading the excavated rab over the lower part of the floor. 1928 Jrnl. Brit. Archaeol. Assoc. XXXIV. 153 The paving stones had been laid on the rab or subsoil. 1961 E. Clark Cornish Fogous ix. 68 A drain passes from the fogou to the outer wall, the floor of which is composed of the natural rab... The floor of the main structure is of stoneless rab. 1962 Punch 30 May 836/3 Clutching for dear life at the poor rab (the local name for the pink subsoil) this tree has grown. |