froe

plural froes · alternative frow

1. A cleaving tool for splitting cask staves and shingles from a block of wood.

   Patch shingles on the barn roof: do we have a maul and froe?

   1997, Charles Frazier, chapter 4, in Cold Mountain, London: Hodder and Stoughton, page 88

   Synonyms: throe

plural froes · alternative frow

1. obsoleteA dirty woman; a slattern; a frow.

   1630, Michael Drayton, Nymphal IV, [from The Muses Elizium], 1793, The Works of the British Poets, Volume 3: Drayton, Carew & Suckling, page 618, Like to thoſe raging frantic froes / For Bacchus' feaſts prepared;