▪ I. skein, n.1
(skeɪn)
Forms: α. 5–7 skeyne, 7– skein. β. 5 skayn(e, 6–7 skaine, 6–8 skain; 6 scayne, 7 sc(h)aine, 8 scain. γ. 6 scan (Sc. sc-, skanȝe), skane, 7 scane. δ. 6 sken(e, Sc. skenye, -ȝe, 7 skiene, skeane, 9 skean.
[ad. OF. escaigne (1354 in Godefroy; mod.Picard dial. écaigne, écagne), of obscure origin. Cf. med.L. scagna (1294 in Du Cange).]
1. a. A quantity of thread or yarn, wound to a certain length upon a reel, and usually put up in a kind of loose knot.
A skein of cotton consists of eighty turns of the thread upon a reel fifty-four inches in circumference.
| α c 1440 Promp. Parv. 457/2 Skeyne, of threde, filipulum, versofilum. a 1529 Skelton E. Rummyng 310 Some for very nede Layde downe a skeyne of threde, And some a skeyne of yarne. 1619 in Foster Eng. Factories India (1906) I. 116 [We] send you two skeynes [of silk] hearewith. 1681 J. Flavel Right Man's Ref. 249 Like a ravelled skeyn of silk, so entangled and perplexed. 1704 De Foe Giving Alms no Charity, For every skein of worsted these poor children spin, there must be a skein the less spun by some poor family. 1772 M. Cutler in Life, etc. (1888) I. 39 They spun forty-two and a half skeins of line, worsted, and tow⁓yarn. 1825 J. Nicholson Operat. Mechanic 392 The silk is imported into this country thus wound off into skeins. 1884 W. S. B. M{supc}Laren Spinning (ed. 2) 179 Woollen yarn is reckoned in skeins, the scale being based on the number of yards per dram. |
| β 1442 in Willis & Clark Cambridge (1886) I. 387, xvj Skaynys of grete packethrede. 1486 Naval Acc. Hen. VII (1896) 13, vj skaynes of Saile Twyne. 1579 in Rel. Ant. I. 255 For 4 scaynes yelow sylke, 6d. 1628–9 Sarum Churchw. Acc. (ed. Swayne) 313, 2 skaines of silke to sewe y⊇ cushin, 2d. 1688 Holme Armoury iii. xxi. (Roxb.) 253/1 This is an other kind of engine..by which silk skaines or hanks..are vnwound. 1765 Phil. Trans. LV. 205 The manufacturers usually distinguish and denominate the fineness, by the number of skains which go to the pound. |
| γ 1523 Skelton Garl. Laurel 798 Reche me that skane of tewly sylk. 1527 Dunmow Churchw. MS. lf. 6 b, For ii scanys of whyte threde for the copys, iid. 1675 in Wiseman Surg. Treat. 300, I kept the Ulcer..open with a Scane of Silk. |
| δ 1541 Acc. Ld. High Treas. Scot. VIII. 23 Foure skenȝe pakin threid, price xij d. 1546 Yatton Churchw. Acc. (Som. Rec. Soc.) 159 Payd for a skene of sylke to mend the second cope, ij{supd}. 1591 in Antiquary XXXII. 79 A sken of black stychinge silke, i d. 1622 Mabbe tr. Aleman's Guzman d'Alf. 54 The Skeane there breaketh soonest, where the Threed is finest. 1649 Davenant Love & Hon. ii. iii, A skeane of brown thread. 1816 Scott Antiq. i, She sold tape, thread, needles, skeans of worsted. |
b. fig. (esp. with ravelled, tangled, etc.).
| 1606 Shakes. Tr. & Cr. v. i. 35 Thou idle, immateriall skiene of Sleyd silke. 1625 B. Jonson Staple of N. v. ii, My parts depend Vpon the vnwinding this so knotted skeane. 1636 T. Cole in Ann. Dubrensia (1877) 39 Detraction will be ready to undoe, And ravell out my skaines, ere they can well Bee stretch't upon the Loome. 1784 Cowper Task iii. 145 They disentangle from the puzzled skein..The threads of politic and shrewd design. 1797 Enquirer i. xi. 95 In the tangled skein of human affairs. 1831 Scott Ct. Rob. xxxi, The unwinding of the perilous skein of state politics. 1884 Spectator 2 Aug. 999/2 The appointment..might introduce order into the confused skein of our policy there. 1932 W. B. Yeats Words for Music 26 For love is but a skein unwound Between the dark and dawn. 1935 T. S. Eliot Murder in Cathedral i. 37 You hold the skein: wind, Thomas, wind The thread of eternal life and death. 1939 Dylan Thomas Map of Love 16, I with a living skein, Tongue and ear in the thread, angle the temple-bound Curl-locked and animal cavepools of spells and bone. |
† c. A certain length or quantity of girth-web made up like a skein. Obs.—1
| 1566 in Hay Fleming Mary Q. of Scots (1897) 499 Tuay skenyeis of girdis to bind up the bedde. |
2. transf. a. A small cluster or arrangement resembling a skein.
| 1687 Death's Vision x. (1713) 51 note 13 The Glands are found to be nothing but a Clew or Skain of most fine and slender Pipes. 1818 Keats Endym. iii. 757 Ah, gentle! 'tis as weak as spider's skein. 1874 T. Hardy Far from Madding Crowd I. xxiii. 256 Her red cheeks and lips contrasting lustrously with the mazy skeins of her shadowy hair. 1878 J. Miller Songs of Italy 117 Far And near red lightning in ribbon and skein Did write upon heaven Jehovah's name. |
b. A flight of wild fowl.
| 1851 G. H. Kingsley Sp. & Trav. (1900) 119 Skeins of wild geese fly clanking over our heads. 1860 G. J. Whyte-Melville Holmby House I. 53 A skein of wild fowl..were winging their arrowy flight. 1889 H. M. Doughty Friesland Meres 182 Only one skein of geese passed over us. |
† c. Cytology. The chromosomal strands in a cell undergoing mitosis; used attrib. to denote the stage of mitosis now known as prophase; = spireme. Obs.
| 1889 Q. Jrnl. Microsc. Sci. XXX. 164 The first stage of karyokinesis, the so-called ‘dense skein’ (‘dichter Knäuel’). Ibid. 173 Rable says definitely that he has always found the longitudinal splitting of the chromatic threads to be completed at the end of the skein phase. 1904 Science 4 Mar. 393/1 No sign of chromatin thread (linin or skein) is apparent. |
3. attrib., as skein-silk, skein wool, etc.; skein-winder.
| 1764 Jackson's Oxf. Jrnl. 17 Mar., Scain and Barrel Pig-Tail, and Shagg Tobaccoes. 1858 Simmonds Dict. Trade, Skein-silk Dyer, a dyer of raw silk. 1868 Rep. U.S. Commiss. Agric. (1869) 289 Skein sewing-silk is made of three to ten threads twisted together, and two of these latter doubled. 1875 W. Morris in Mackail Life (1899) I. 318 A great heap of skein-wool has come for me. 1920 L. Hooper Weaving for Beginner x. 76 A skein winder..is only required if the weft is supplied to the weaver in skeins. 1964 O. G. Tod Joy of Hand Weaving (ed. 2) xviii. 87 If winding from a skein, place the skein around an adjustable skein-winder. |
▪ II. skein, n.2
(skeɪn)
Also skain.
[ad. Du. scheen (MDu. scheene), = G. schiene in the same senses (see Grimm, s.v.), cognate with shin n.1]
1. A split of osier after being dressed for use in fine basket-work.
| 1837 L. Hebert Eng. & Mech. Encycl. I. 154 The osiers are divided into four parts, lengthways, which are called splits, and these are afterwards reduced to various degrees of fineness, when they are called skeins. 1851–4 Tomlinson's Cycl. Useful Arts (1867) I. 109/1 By passing the splits between the two edges, they are reduced to skains. 1875 Encycl. Brit. III. 423/1 The skains are frequently smoked and dyed either of dull or brilliant colours. |
2. U.S. A metal head or thimble protecting the spindle of a wooden axle.
| 1862 T. Hughes in Ludlow Hist. U.S. 345 One of the free⁓state settlers went to the blacksmith's shop unarmed, carrying a waggon skein to be repaired. 1875 Knight Dict. Mech. 2193/2 The ordinary skein consists of three straps, let into slots in the arm. |
▪ III. skein, v.
(skeɪn)
Also 8 skain.
[f. skein n.1]
trans. To make into skeins. Also fig.
| 1775 Ash, Skain, to wind and make up threads in knots or small parcels. 1864 Intellect. Obs. No. 34. 303 The men skeining the cotton. 1899 Academy 11 Feb. 184/1 Flax was..spun into thread, skeined, and bleached in butter milk. 1955 E. Bowen World of Love xi. 219 Water skeined the landscape. 1971 ‘D. Halliday’ Dolly & Doctor Bird v. 62 The Florida coast. Flat land skeined with sheets of flat water. |
Hence skeined ppl. a.; ˈskeiner, one who or that which makes yarn into skeins.
| c 1885 G. M. Hopkins Poems (1967) 98 Let life, waned, ah let life wind Off her once skeined stained veined variety upon, all on two spools. 1977 P. Scupham Hinterland 8 When Vulcan beat new armour out for Rome..Skeined cupids hooded their toy bacchanals. |
| 1921 Dict. Occup. Terms (1927) 169/1 Skeiner (twine); minds skein or rand machine, which winds finished twine into skeins. Ibid. 367/2 Bundler (flax and hemp); skeiner; puts together necessary number of hanks of yarn to form a bundle. 1931 M. L. Davies Life as we have known It 74 As a ‘skeiner’ her work was to separate and twist up the skeins from the ‘bond’ (on a silk mill). 1969 E. H. Pinto Treen 318/2 The niddy-noddy was a combined measure and skeiner. |
▪ IV. skein(e
var. forms of skene1.