/sɑːv/, /sælv/, /sæ(l)v/
OriginFrom Middle English salve, from Old English sealf, from Proto-West Germanic *salbu, from Proto-Germanic *salbō, from Proto-Indo-European *solp-éh₂, from *selp- (“salve, ointment”).
Cognates
Cognate with Middle Low German salve (Danish salve, Dutch zalf), Old High German salba (German Salbe), Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌻𐌱𐍉𐌽𐍃 (salbōns), Albanian gjalpë (“butter”), Sanskrit सर्पिस् (sarpís), Ancient Greek ἔλπος (élpos).
- countable, uncountableAn ointment, cream, or balm with soothing, healing, or calming effects.
- countable, uncountableAny remedy or action that soothes or heals.
“Your forgiveness was a salve to my conscience and a balm to my wounded ego.”
“[Title:] Tame March PCE inflation no salve after downbeat Q1 US GDP report”
- transitiveTo calm or assuage.
“She feels guilty for pampering him, and salves her conscience by bossily ordering him to go and fetch the clothes from the line[.]”
- To heal by applications or medicaments; to apply salve to; to anoint.
“I do beseech your majesty […] salve the long-grown wounds of my intemperance."”
- To heal; to remedy; to cure; to make good.
“But Ebranck salved both their infamies / With noble deedes.”
“What may we do, then, to salve this seeming inconsistence?”
- datedTo salvage.
“The interior woodwork was largely salved from the two cars, as well as the majority of the fittings and seats.”
- obsoleteTo save (the appearances or the phenomena); to explain (a celestial phenomenon); to account for (the apparent motions of the celestial bodies).
- obsoleteTo resolve (a difficulty); to refute (an objection); to harmonize (an apparent contradiction).
“He which should hold it more rational to make the whole Universe move, and thereby to salve the Earths mobility, is more unreasonable....”
- obsoleteTo explain away; to mitigate; to excuse.
- transitiveTo say “salve” to; to greet; to salute.
“By this that ſtraunger knight in preſence came, / And goodly ſalued them; who nought againe / Him anſwered, as courteſie became, / But with ſterne lookes, and ſtomachous diſdaine, / Gaue ſignes of gru”
Formssalves(plural) · salves(present, singular, third-person) · salving(participle, present) · salved(participle, past) · salved(past)