''eaves'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260813235252-00-⌔

eaves - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

eaves pl (plural only)

• (architecture) The underside of a roof that extends beyond the external walls of a building.
  • ✤ Him that you term’d Sir, the good old Lord Gonzallo,/His teares runs downe his beard like winters drops/From eaues of reeds: […]¹
  • ✤ Thus night oft ſee me in thy pale career,/Till civil-ſuited morn appeer,/[…]/Or uſher’d with a ſhower ſtill,/When the guſt hath blown his fill,/Ending on the ruſsling Leaves,/With minute drops from off the Eaves.²
  • ✤ By my window bowered round with leaves,/And down my cheeks the quick tears ran/Like twinkling rain-drops from the eaves,/When warm spring showers are passing o’er: […]³
  • ✤ Enclose open eaves with noncombustible soffit material.⁴
• (by extension) Something that extends over or projects beyond.
  • ✤ But after many strains and heaves/He got up to the Saddle eaves.⁵
  • ✤ The mystic glory swims away;/From off my bed the moonlight dies;/And closing eaves of wearied eyes/I sleep till dusk is dipt in gray: […]⁶

Noun

eaves

• plural of eave

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /iːvz/
• Audio (Southern England): 🔊
• (General American) IPA: /ivz/
• Homophone: eves
• Rhymes: -iːvz

Etymology 1

📊 ➺ 🖼️ ➺

From Middle English eves (“projecting lower edge of a roof”) [and other forms],⁷ from Old English efes, yfes, ﹡ofes (“edge of a roof”), from Proto-West Germanic ﹡ubisu (“hall”), from Proto-Germanic ﹡ubiswō (compare Gothic 𐌿𐌱𐌹𐌶𐍅𐌰 (ubizwa), Old High German obasa (“hall; porch; roof”)), perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European ﹡upér (“above; over”) (whence over).⁸⁹

Etymology 2

From eave +‎ -s, from a misinterpretation of the -s ending of eaves as forming a plural.¹⁰

Printed 2026-08-13.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], page 16, column 2: ↩

2. a. 1645, John Milton, “Il Penseroso”, in Poems of Mr. John Milton, […], London: […] Ruth Raworth for Humphrey Mosely, […], published 1646, →OCLC, page 42: ↩

3. 1818 August, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Rosalind and Helen”, in Rosalind and Helen, a Modern Eclogue; with Other Poems, London: […] [C. H. Reynell] for C[harles] and J[ames] Ollier, […], published 1819, →OCLC, page 22: ↩

4. 2024 November 10, Alaa Elassar, “As California wildfires become more frequent, people will need to fireproof their homes. Here’s what it takes to do it”, in CNN ‎${}^{[1]}$, archived from the original on 14 December 2024: ↩

5. 1662 (indicated as 1663), [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]. Canto I.”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, 1905, →OCLC, page 14: ↩

6. 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto LXV”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 92: ↩

7. “ēves, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007. ↩

8. Compare “eaves, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2020. ↩

9. “eaves, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022. ↩

10. Compare “eaves, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2020. ↩