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screw

Pronunciation: /ˈskɹuː/

The English word “screw” has 20 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A simple machine, a helical inclined plane.
  2. A (usually) metal fastener consisting of a partially or completely threaded shank, sometimes with a threaded point, and a head used to both hold the top material and to drive the screw either directly into a soft material or into a prepared hole.
  3. A ship's propeller.
  4. An Archimedes screw.
  5. A steam vessel propelled by a screw instead of wheels.
  6. The motion of screwing something; a turn or twist to one side.
  7. A prison guard.
  8. An extortioner; a sharp bargainer; a skinflint.
  9. An instructor who examines with great or unnecessary severity; also, a searching or strict examination of a student by an instructor.
  10. Sexual intercourse; the act of screwing.
  11. A casual sexual partner.
  12. Salary, wages.
  13. Backspin.
  14. A twist of paper, especially one containing a small quantity of a material such as salt or tobacco.
  15. An old, worn-out, unsound and worthless horse.
  16. A straight line in space with which a definite linear magnitude termed the pitch is associated. It is used to express the displacement of a rigid body, which may always be made to consist of a rotation about an axis combined with a translation parallel to that axis.
  17. An amphipod crustacean.
  18. Rheumatism.

verb

  1. To connect or assemble pieces using a screw.
  2. To have sexual intercourse with.

Etymology

From Middle English screw, scrue (“screw”); apparently, despite the difference in meaning, from Old French escroue (“nut, cylindrical socket, screwhole”), from Latin scrōfa (“female pig”) through comparison with the corkscrew shape of a pig's penis. There is also the Old French escruve (“screw”), from Old Dutch *scrūva ("screw"; whence Middle Dutch schruyve (“screw”)), which probably influenced…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.