steeve

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• IPA^(key): /stiːv/
• Rhymes: -iːv
• Homophone: Steve

steeve (plural steeves)

1. (nautical) The angle that a bowsprit makes with the horizon, or with the line of the vessel's keel.
2. A spar, with a block at one end, used in stowing cotton bales and similar cargo needing to be packed tightly.

steeve (third-person singular simple present steeves, present participle steeving, simple past and past participle steeved)

1. (archaic) To project upward, or make an angle with the horizon or with the line of a vessel's keel; said of the bowsprit, etc.
2. (transitive) To stow, as bales in a vessel's hold, by means of a steeve.
   • 1897, Rudyard Kipling, Captains Courageous:

     "They are all alike to me." And indeed to a landsman, the nodding schooners around seemed run from the same mold.
     "They ain't, though. That yaller, dirty packet with her bowsprit steeved that way, she's the Hope of Prague. Nick Brady's her skipper, the meanest man on the Banks. […] "

• vestee