snib

S1N1I1B3
UK/snɪb/

noun

A latch or fastening for a door, window etc.

“As at the stok the bere; Snybbith the hardy houndis that ar ken.”

Scrabble 6
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Meanings

nounsnib (plural snibs)

plural snibs

  1. AustraliaScotlandA latch or fastening for a door, window etc.

    He did not like me coming in except if I was going to bed. I heard him saying to my maw about a snib for the door.

    2008, James Kelman, Kieron Smith, Boy, Penguin, published 2009, page 99
  2. obsoleteA reprimand; a snub.

    ill - strain'd snibs

    1601 (date written), Iohn Marston [i.e., John Marston], What You Will, London: […] G[eorge] Eld, for Thomas Thorppe, published 1607, →OCLC, (please specify the page)
verbsnib (third-person singular simple present snibs, present participle snibbing, simple past and past participle snibbed)

present singular third person snibs · participle present snibbing · participle past snibbed · past snibbed

  1. AustraliaScotlandtransitiveTo latch (a door, window, etc.).

    Window is snibbed on the inner side. Framework is solid. No hinges at the side. Let us open it.

    1890 February, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “Sherlock Holmes Gives a Demonstration”, in The Sign of Four (Standard Library), London: Spencer Blackett […], →OCLC, page 90
    1 more example

    All moved to the front street, where Grierson snibbed on his tail-light and turned to ask the trooper, "They've got the main road ploughed up farther on, haven't they?"

    1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 162
  2. obsoleteto rebuke, to scold, to reprimand

    As at the stok the bere; Snybbith the hardy houndis that ar ken.

Synonyms & antonyms

Also see
sneb

Origin

To the same root as snub. For the sense reprimant, compare cognate Old Norse sneypa (“to rebuff, infringe, etc”). The etymology appears visible in Nordic cognates, to an original sense of “pinching off” (→ “to repress, infringe”), really “snipping off” (Old Norse sneypa, Norwegian Nynorsk snøypa, Swedish snöpa, snoppa, snipa, snippa (“to pinch off, to squeeze off, to castrate”)), with nouns denoting “pinched end → point” (cf. Swedish snip (“snout, spout”), snibb (“lobe”)). The latch sense could stem from older latches which were lobe-shaped, then analog to Swedish snibb (“lobe”). Another idea could be that the 'latch action' derives from the action of “pinching off” becoming “closing off”. A third idea could be that it derives from reprimanding through “locking” a door. The term may also have been affected by words like snap via the “snapping” action of a latch.

Full word history & related roots →

Rhymes & wordplay

Rhymes with snib

libcribribnibbibglibtribsibjibbibbgibHibtibsquibchibBzybcut of one's jibdribdybprime ribspareribvib.
All rhymes →

Anagrams

binsnibsNiSb
Cite this entry
APA

snib. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/snib

MLA

“snib.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/snib. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “snib,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/snib.

Source: snib on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.