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crabbed

English

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crabbed

  • /kɹæbd/

Where it comes from

From Middle English crabbed; equivalent to crab + -ed.

adjective more crabbed · most crabbed

  1. Bad-tempered or cantankerous. […]O, she is / Ten times more gentle than her father's crabb'd, / And he's composed of harshness.
  2. Cramped, bent. A wrinkled crabbed man they picture thee, Old Winter, with a rugged beard as grey As the long moss upon the apple-tree; […]
  3. of handwriting Crowded together and difficult to read.
  4. of an aircraft Pointed at an angle to the runway during approach and landing to compensate for a crosswind. Unlike most aircraft, the B-52's fully-steerable landing gear allows it to land crabbed and stay crabbed throughout rollout without destroying its tires.
  5. of an approach and landing Performed with one's aircraft pointed at an angle to the runway to compensate for a crosswind; performed with nonzero crab. The Ercoupe can't be cross-controlled, so it has to make a crabbed approach in a crosswind rather than using the sideslip technique.

verb

  1. participle, past simple past and past participle of crab

Translations

Every language

adj (of handwriting) crowded together and difficult to read

Русскийнеразбо́рчивый nerazbórčivyj

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Cite this
MLA

"crabbed." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/crabbed. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

crabbed. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/crabbed

Chicago

"crabbed." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/crabbed.

BibTeX
@misc{crabbed_2026,
  title = {crabbed},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/crabbed},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}