crib
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crib
- /kɹɪb/
Rhymes with -ɪb
Where it comes from
From Middle English crib, cribbe, from Old English crib, cryb, cribb, crybb (“couch, bed; manger, stall”), from Proto-West Germanic *kribbjā, from Proto-Germanic *kribjǭ (“crib, wickerwork”), from Proto-Indo-European *grebʰ-, *gerbʰ- (“bunch, bundle, tuft, clump”), from *ger- (“to turn, twist”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Kräbbe, Krääb, Krääf (“crib”), West Frisian krêbe (“crib”), Dutch krib (“crib, manger”), German Krippe (“rack, crib”), Danish krybbe (“crib”), Icelandic krubba (“crib”). Doublet of crèche. The sense of ‘stealing, taking notes, plagiarize’ seems to have developed out of the verb.
The criminal sense may derive from the 'basket' sense, circa the mid 18th century, in that a poacher could conceal poachings in such a basket (see the 1772 Samuel Foote quotation). The cheating sense probably derives from the criminal sense.
noun cribs
-
A baby’s bed with high, often slatted, often moveable sides, suitable for a child who has outgrown a cradle or bassinet.
In two minutes I was kneeling by the child’s crib, and Sandy was dispatching servants here, there, and everywhere, all over the palace. I took in the situation almost at a glance -- membranous croup!
Similar: cot
- A bed for a child older than a baby. a day or two afterwards I learned that Miss Temple, on returning to her own room at dawn, had found me laid in the little crib; my face against Helen Burns’s shoulder, my arms round her neck. I was asleep, and Helen was -- dead.
- A small sleeping berth in a packet or other small vessel.
- A wicker basket.
- A manger, a feeding trough for animals elevated off the earth or floor, especially one for fodder such as hay.
- The baby Jesus and the manger in a creche or nativity scene, consisting of statues of Mary, Joseph and various other characters such as the magi.
- A bin for drying or storing grain, such as a corn crib. I began to think of my horse. He, however, like an old campaigner, had taken good care of himself. I found him paying assiduous attention to the crib of Indian corn, and dexterously drawing forth and munching the ears that protruded between the bars.
- A small room or covered structure, especially one of rough construction, used for storage or penning animals. A kitchen, a meat-house, a dairy, a crib with two stalls in the rear, one for the horse the other for the cow, were the out-buildings
- A confined space, such as a cage or office cubicle. The singers were in a crib of wirework (like a large meat-safe or bird-cage) in one corner
- A job, a position; (UK) an appointment. He had seen so many lean years of faithful service when the enemy held the corner on all the official cribs that, now in the days of his party’s fatness and of his own righteous reward, the habit of good, honest hustling stuck to him, and he lined up an array of pulls and indorsements that made him
- A hovel, a roughly constructed building best suited to the shelter of animals but used for human habitation. Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs, / Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee, / And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber, / Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
- A boxy structure traditionally built of heavy wooden timbers, to support an existing structure from below, as with a mineshaft or a building being raised off its foundation in preparation for being moved; see cribbing.
- A collection of quotes or references for use in speaking, for assembling a written document, or as an aid to a project of some sort; a crib sheet.
- A minor theft, extortion or embezzlement, with or without criminal intent.
- The card game cribbage. “May we play crib, Mrs. Radford?” he asked.
- The cards discarded by players and used by the dealer, akin to the kitty or widow in other card games. The cards were brought and Fanny played at cribbage with her aunt till bed-time; and as Sir Thomas was reading to himself, no sounds were heard in the room for the next two hours beyond the reckonings of the game—And that makes thirty-one, four in hand and eight in crib.
- A known piece of information corresponding to a section of encrypted text, that is then used to work out the remaining sections.
-
A small holiday home, often near a beach and of simple construction.
Similar: bach
- A snack or packed lunch, especially as taken to work to eat during a break. He ate a thick square of banana cake from his crib and stared into the fire.
- A small raft made of timber.
- The stomach. Here's Pannum and Lap, and good Poplars of Yarrum, / To fill up the Crib, and to comfort the Quarron.
- A literal translation, usually of a work originally in Latin or Ancient Greek. [On Chapman's use of a Latin literal translation of Homer] As will appear, he blocked out his translation from the Latin crib, keeping one eye uneasily on the Greek, and, enlightened by Scapula or by his own poetic intuition, worked out his own rendering, often marking the departure from the Latin b
- A cheat sheet or past test used by students; crib sheet. 'This is not the Berlitz School of Languages, Head of S. If you want to show off your knowledge of foreign jawbreakers, be good enough to provide a crib. Better still, write in English.'
- One’s residence, house or dwelling place, or usual place of resort. Why, you would not be boosing till lightman's in a square crib like mine, as if you were in a flash panny?
verb cribs · cribbing · cribbed
- To place or confine in a crib. They may go to their beds and give themselves no trouble about their work, and yet in the morning the maids will find the kitchen swept up, and water brought in, and the men will find the horses in the stable well cleaned and curried, and perhaps a supply corn cribbed for them from the neighbours ba
- To shut up or confine in a narrow habitation; to cage; to cramp. if only the vital energy be not cribbed or cramped
- To collect one or more passages and/or references for use in a speech, written document or as an aid for some task; to create a crib sheet. I cribbed the recipe from the Food Network site, but made a few changes of my own.
- To plagiarize; to copy; to cheat. He then proceeded to patch his tags together with the help of his Gradus, producing an incongruous and feeble result of eight elegiac lines, the minimum quantity for his form, and finishing up with two highly moral lines extra, making ten in all, which he cribbed entire from one of his books, beginn
- To install timber supports, as with cribbing.
- To steal or embezzle. There are a brace of birds and hare, that I cribbed this morning out of a basket of game.
- To complain, to grumble She calls on the neighbours, she's out half the time and doesn't answer the telephone, and when I start cribbing she just laughs.
- To crowd together, or to be confined, as if in a crib or in narrow accommodations. […] who ſought to make the glory of the Nation and Church of England, which was ever Regal and Epiſcopal ſince it was Chriſtian, truckle under a Scotch Canopy, and to make Biſhops to crib in a Presbyterian trundle-bed; as much as Kingly Majeſtie, to be confounded with Democracy.
- To seize the manger or other solid object with the teeth and draw in wind.
- To use a known piece of information corresponding to a section of encrypted text, to work out the remaining sections.
Thesaurus
Closest in meaning: cot, pony, trot, cribbage, mattress, cradle, pad, sack, locker, wardrobe, bedside, cupboard, bunk, closet, band, bed
Translations
Every language
noun a baby’s bed with high sides
| Español | cuna |
|---|---|
| 日本語 | ベビーベッド bebī beddo |
| 中文 | 娃娃床 wáwachuáng |
| Português | berço |
| Français | berceau |
| Deutsch | Gitterbett |
| Italiano | culla, lettino a sponde alte |
| Ελληνικά | κούνια koúnia |
| Русский | де́тская крова́тка détskaja krovátka, крова́тка krovátka |
| Tiếng Việt | nôi |
noun a feeding trough for animals
| 한국어 | 구유 guyu |
|---|---|
| 日本語 | まぐさ桶 magusa-oke |
| Português | manjedoura, cocho |
| Français | huche |
| Deutsch | Krippe |
| Italiano | greppia, mangiatoia |
| Ελληνικά | παχνί pachní |
| Русский | я́сли jásli |
noun a bin or box for storing grain
| Русский | за́кром zákrom |
|---|
noun (cryptography)
| Français | antisèche |
|---|
noun (obsolete in English) petty theft or plagiarism
| Português | furto, plágio |
|---|---|
| Русский | спи́сывание spísyvanije |
noun notes concealed by a student to aid him/her in test or examination
| Español | machete, chuleta |
|---|---|
| 日本語 | カニングペーパー kaningupēpā, カンペ kanpe |
| 中文 | 作弊條 /作弊条 zuòbìtiáo, 小抄 xiǎochāo |
| Português | cola |
| Français | antisèche |
| Deutsch | Spickzettel, Schummelzettel |
| Ελληνικά | σκονάκι skonáki |
| Русский | шпарга́лка špargálka, шпо́ра špóra |
noun (slang) one’s residence, or where one normally hangs out; a house or dwelling place
| Русский | хата xata |
|---|
verb to plagiarize or steal
| Español | fusilar |
|---|---|
| Русский | спи́сывать spísyvatʹ |
Talk about this word "crib." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/crib. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. crib. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/crib "crib." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/crib.
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BibTeX
@misc{crib_2026,
title = {crib},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/crib},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
