Stave | Webster's Dictionary (1865)

Stāve, n.

noun

n. [Eng. staff, Dan. stav, Ger. stab.]

Sense 1. A thin, narrow piece of wood, of which casks are made.

Sense 2. A part of a psalm appointed to be sung in churches; a metrical portion; a staff.

Sense 3. (Mus.) The five horizontal and parallel lines, and the spaces on which the notes of tunes are written or printed; the staff. [Obs.]

Stāve, v. t.

verbtransitive

v. t. [imp. & p. p. STAVED, or STOVE; p. pr. & vb. n. STAVING.] [From stave, staff, n.]

To thrust through with a staff; to break a hole in; to burst; as, to stave a cask.
To push, as with a staff;—with off.

The condition of a servant staves him off to a distance. South. 3. To delay forcibly; to drive away;—usually with off, as, to stave off the execution of a project. And answered with such craft as women use, Guilty or guiltless, to stave off a chance That breaks upon them perilously. Tennyson. 4. To pour out; to suffer to be lost by breaking the cask. All the wine in the city has been staved. Sandys.

To furnish with staves or rundles. [Obs.]
To render solid by compressing with a pointed or edged tool; as, to stave the joints of pipes into which lead has been run.

To stave and tail, to part as dogs, by interposing a staff and by pulling the tail.

Stāve, v. i.

verbintransitive

v. i. To fight with staves. [Obs.] Hudibras.

So many warriors, and so stout, As he had done, and staved it out. Hudibras.