reive

present singular third person reives · participle present reiving · participle past reived · past reived · participle past reft · past reft

1. archaicArchaic spelling of reave.

   Spine-chilling tales of reiving raids are a legendary legacy of these violent times, when careless murder, theft and pillage were everyday professions.

   2011, Mark Richards, Hadrian's Wall Path: Two-way national trail description, →ISBN, page 102

   2 more examples

   [The earl] commands all within his charge to abstain from reiving or stealing from the subjects of Scotland. For such riefs as have been made upon them, the Queen minds to have the same mended by justice.

   1567 July 19, Proclamation by the Earl of Bedford, quoted in Calendar of State Papers, foreign series, of the Reign of Elizabeth, 1566-8 (1871), volume 10

   So, although many borderers regularly engaged in reiving, most were also part-time agriculturalists, raising crops such as oats and rye, as well as livestock.

   2014, Peter T. Leeson, Anarchy Unbound, →ISBN