scab, n. [OE. scab, scabbe, shabbe; cf. AS. scæb, sceabb, scebb, Dan. & Sw. skab, and also L. scabies, fr. scabere to scratch, akin to E. shave. See Shave, and cf. Shab, Shabby.].

An incrustation over a sore, wound, vesicle, or pustule, formed by the drying up of the discharge from the diseased part. [1913 Webster]
The itch in man; also, the scurvy. [1913 Webster]
The mange, esp. when it appears on sheep. Chaucer. [1913 Webster]
A disease of potatoes producing pits in their surface, caused by a minute fungus (Tiburcinia Scabies). [1913 Webster]
A slight irregular protuberance which defaces the surface of a casting, caused by the breaking away of a part of the mold. [1913 Webster]
A mean, dirty, paltry fellow. Shak. [1913 Webster]
A nickname for a workman who engages for lower wages than are fixed by the trades unions; also, for one who takes the place of a workman on a strike. [1913 Webster]
Any one of various more or less destructive fungus diseases attacking cultivated plants, and usually forming dark-colored crustlike spots. [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

scab, v. i.

To become covered with a scab; as, the wound scabbed over. [1913 Webster]
to take the place of a striking worker. [PJC]

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OXFORD DICTIONARY

scab, n. & v.
--n.
1 a dry rough crust formed over a cut, sore, etc. in healing.
2 (often attrib.) colloq. derog. a person who refuses to strike or join a trade union, or who tries to break a strike by working; a blackleg.
3 the mange or a similar skin disease esp. in animals.
4 a fungous plant-disease causing scablike roughness.
5 a dislikeable person.
--v.intr. (scabbed, scabbing)
1 act as a scab.
2 (of a wound etc.) form a scab; heal over.

Derivative

scabbed adj. scabby adj. (scabbier, scabbiest). scabbiness n. scablike adj.

Etymology

ME f. ON skabbr (unrecorded), corresp. to OE sceabb

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THESAURUS

scab

abscess, aposteme, bed sore, birthmark, blackhead, blackleg, blain, bleb, blemish, blister, boil, bubo, bulla, bunion, canker, canker sore, carbuncle, chancre, chancroid, check, chilblain, cicatrix, cicatrize, close up, cold sore, comedo, crack, crater, craze, crust, deface, defacement, defect, deform, deformation, deformity, disfiguration, disfigure, disfigurement, distort, distortion, effloresce, encrust, eschar, fault, felon, fester, festering, fever blister, fink, fistula, flaw, freckle, furuncle, furunculus, gathering, granulate, gumboil, heal, heal over, hemangioma, hemorrhoids, hickey, incrust, incrustation, keloid, kibe, kink, knit, lentigo, lesion, loricate, mar, milium, mole, needle scar, nevus, papula, papule, paronychia, parulis, pastry shell, petechia, piecrust, piles, pimple, pit, pock, pockmark, polyp, port-wine mark, port-wine stain, pustule, rat, rift, right itself, rising, scab over, scale, scar, scarify, scratch, sebaceous cyst, set, shell, soft chancre, sore, split, stalactite, stalagmite, stigma, strawberry mark, strikebreaker, sty, suppuration, swelling, track, tubercle, twist, ulcer, ulceration, verruca, vesicle, wale, warp, wart, weal, welt, wen, wheal, whelk, whitehead, whitlow, wound

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ROGET THESAURUS

scab

Tergiversation

N tergiversation, change of mind, change of intention, change of purpose, afterthought, tergiversation, recantation, palinode, palinody, renunciation, abjuration, abjurement, defection, going over, apostasy, retraction, retractation, withdrawal, disavowal, revocation, revokement, reversal, repentance, redintegratio amoris, coquetry, vacillation, backsliding, volte-face, turn coat, turn tippet, rat, apostate, renegade, convert, pervert, proselyte, deserter, backslider, blackleg, crawfish, scab, mugwump, recidivist, time server, time pleaser, timist, Vicar of Bray, trimmer, ambidexter, weathercock, Janus, changeful, irresolute, ductile, slippery as an eel, trimming, ambidextrous, timeserving, coquetting, revocatory, reactionary, a change came o'er the spirit of my dream.

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