hive
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hive¹
- /haɪv/ US, UK
Rhymes with -aɪv
Where it comes from
From Middle English hyve, from Old English hȳf, from Proto-West Germanic *hūfi, from Proto-Indo-European *kuHp- (“water vessel”), from *kew- (“to bend, curve”).
See also Dutch huif (“beehive”), Danish dialect huv (“ship’s hull”); also Latin cūpa (“tub, vat”), Ancient Greek κύπη (kúpē, “gap, hole”), κύπελλον (kúpellon, “beaker”), Sanskrit कूप (kū́pa, “cave”). Doublet of coupe, cup, and keeve.
The computing term was chosen as an in-joke relating to bees; see this for more.
noun hives
-
A structure, whether artificial or natural, for housing a swarm of honeybees.
First, for thy Bees a quiet Station find, / And lodge 'em under Covert of the Wind: / For Winds, when homeward they return, will drive / The loaded Carriers from their Ev'ning Hive.
Similar: beehive
- The bees of one hive; a swarm of bees. When that the general is not like the hive, to whom the foragers shall all repair, what honey is expected?
- A place swarming with busy occupants; a crowd. There the horde of Roman robbers mock at a barbarous adversary. / There the hive of Roman liars worship a gluttonous emperor-idiot.
- A section of the registry. Windows builds the registry from the five registry hives[…]
verb hives · hiving · hived
- To collect (bees) into a hive. to hive a swarm of bees
- To store (something other than bees) in, or as if in, a hive. Hiving wisdom with each studious year.
- To form a hive-like entity.
- To take lodging or shelter together; to reside in a collective body. The patch is kind enough, but a huge feeder, / Snail-slow in profit, and he sleeps by day / More than the wild-cat; drones hive not with me; / Therefore I part with him; and part with him / To one what I would have him help to waste / His borrowed purse. […]
- Of insects: to enter or possess a hive.
hive²
- /haɪv/ US, UK
Rhymes with -aɪv
noun hives
- An itchy, red, swollen area of the skin; singular or attributive form of hives. […] if you are allergic to it, the skin produces a localized red, itchy reaction, a hive. The hive appears within minutes of the allergy skin test and lasts up to approximately 24 hours.
Thesaurus
Closest in meaning: beehive, apiary, swarm, beetle, daycare, ship, section, cluster, single, subtree, queenless, day-care, bee-hive, beehiving, superhive, honey house
Translations
Talk about this word "hive." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/hive. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. hive. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/hive "hive." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/hive.Cite this
@misc{hive_2026,
title = {hive},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/hive},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
