ebb – English noun declension

English noun forms of ebb

Noun: ebb
Singularebb
Pluralebbs

Sample Sentences

  • The boats will go out on the ebb.
  • Thou shoreless flood which in thy ebb and flow / Claspest the limits of morality! [1824, Mary Shelley, Time:]
  • Men come from distant parts to admire the tides of Solway, which race in at flood and retreat at ebb with a greater speed than a horse can follow. [1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide:]
  • Thus all the treasure of our flowing years, / Our ebb of life for ever takes away. [1684, Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon, Essay on Translated Verse:]
  • This reflection thawed my congealing blood, and again the tide of life and love flowed impetuously onward, again to ebb as my busy thoughts changed. [1826, [Mary Shelley], The Last Man. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC:]
  • Industrialism hasn’t been an abiding set of activities in any particular place but rather a dynamic cycle, of takeoff, peak, and ebb. [2012, James Howard Kunstler, Too Much Magic, page 74:]
  • Painting was then at its lowest ebb. [1695, C[harles] A[lphonse] du Fresnoy, translated by John Dryden, De Arte Graphica. The Art of Painting, […], London: […] J[ohn] Heptinstall for W. Rogers, […], →OCLC:]
  • A "lowest ebb" implies something singular and finite, but for many of us, born in the Depression and raised by parents distrustful of fortune, an "ebb" might easily have lasted for years. [2002, Joyce Carol Oates, The New Yorker, number 22 & 29 April:]
  • The 1987 book British Piers was written at a time when Britain's seaside resorts were perhaps at their lowest ebb, with a groundswell of support for rejuvenation and conservation just beginning. [2020 July 29, Dr Joseph Brennan, “Railways that reach out over the waves”, in Rail, page 51:]

Etymology

1. From Middle English ebbe, from Old English ebba (“ebb, tide”), from Proto-West Germanic *abbjā, from Proto-Germanic *abjô, *abjǭ, from Proto-Germanic *ab (“off, away”), from Proto-Indo-European *apó.
2. See also West Frisian ebbe, Dutch eb, German Ebbe, Danish ebbe, Old Norse efja (“countercurrent”), Old English af. More at of, off. See: Middle English Nouns 'ebbe', Old English Nouns 'ebba', Dutch Nouns 'eb', German Nouns 'Ebbe', Old Norse Nouns 'efja'.

Verbs referencing "ebb"

Icelandic Nouns efja, German Nouns Ebbe.