Meaning

6 senses
  1. A squarish, heavy knife used by butchers for hacking through bones, etc.

    Hackbeil, Cleaver

    большо́й нож мясника́bolʹšój nož mjasniká, нож для нареза́ния мя́саnož dlja narezánija mjása, сека́чsekáč

    дровоколdrovokol

  2. A Paleolithic biface.

  3. (Bahamas)A type of clave, or rhythm stick, a concussive musical instrument used in traditional Bahamian music.

  4. (figuratively)The act of eliminating someone or something, especially when done by someone with a history of other eliminations; a dismissal, rejection, or removal.

  5. A type of oar blade with an asymmetric, mostly rectangular shape that resembles a cleaving knife.

  6. A line segment that bisects the perimeter of a triangle and has one endpoint at the midpoint of one of the triangle's three sides.

More definitions
  • a butcher's knife having a large square blade

Examples

3 sentences
  1. I'm going to chop her head off with a cleaver.

    CC BY · Tatoeba · Lepotdeterre · C1Open on TatoebaReport a problem
  2. This is a cleaver.

    CC BY · Tatoeba · adiante19 · C1Open on TatoebaReport a problem
  3. Ziri asked Rima if he could borrow her cleaver.

    CC BY · Tatoeba · Amastan · C2Open on TatoebaReport a problem

Translations

9 languages
Українська
By meaning 1
a squarish knife used for hacking:
Русский
By meaning 1
a squarish knife used for hacking:
Deutsch
By meaning 1
a squarish knife used for hacking:

Origin

From Middle English clevere, equivalent to cleave + -er.

From Middle English clevere, equivalent to cleave + -er.

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Forms

plural: cleavers
Singularcleaver
Pluralcleavers

regular

Synonyms

3 synonyms
Close in meaning

Word family

2 related words

See also

neighbours in the dictionary
cleaver — meaning, examples, forms, synonyms | Krumeto