wale

• POS: Adjective, Noun, Verb (usu participle), Verb (transitive)

CIDE DICTIONARY

wale, n. [AS. walu a mark of stripes or blows, probably originally, a rod; akin to Icel. völr, Goth. walus a rod, staff. Goal, Weal a wale.].

•  A streak or mark made on the skin by a rod or whip; a stripe; a wheal. See Wheal.  Holland.  [1913 Webster]
•  A ridge or streak rising above the surface, as of cloth; hence, the texture of cloth.  [1913 Webster]

  "Thou 'rt rougher far,
  And of a coarser wale, fuller of pride."  [1913 Webster]
•  A timber bolted to a row of piles to secure them together and in position.  Knight.  [1913 Webster]
•  Certain sets or strakes of the outside planking of a vessel; as, the main wales, or the strakes of planking under the port sills of the gun deck; channel wales, or those along the spar deck, etc.  [1913 Webster]

Wale knot. (Naut.) See Wall knot, under 1st Wall.

wale, v. t. 

•  To mark with wales, or stripes.  [1913 Webster]
•  To choose; to select; specifically (Mining), to pick out the refuse of (coal) by hand, in order to clean it.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

wale, n. & v.
--n.
1 = WEAL(1).
2 a ridge on a woven fabric, e.g. corduroy.
3 Naut. a broad thick timber along a ship's side.
4 a specially woven strong band round a woven basket.
--v.tr. provide or mark with wales.

Idiom

wale-knot a knot made at the end of a rope by intertwining strands to prevent unravelling or act as a stopper.

Etymology

OE walu stripe, ridge

THESAURUS

wale

abscess, aposteme, bed sore, bilge, birthmark, blackhead, blain, bleb, blemish, blister, blob, boil, boss, bow, bubble, bubo, bulb, bulge, bulla, bump, bunch, bunion, burl, button, cahot, canker, canker sore, carbuncle, chancre, chancroid, check, chilblain, chine, cicatrix, clump, cold sore, comedo, condyle, convex, crack, crater, craze, defacement, defect, deformation, deformity, disfiguration, disfigurement, distortion, dowel, ear, eschar, fault, feel, felon, fester, festering, fever blister, finish, fistula, flange, flap, flaw, freckle, furuncle, furunculus, gall, gathering, gnarl, grain, granular texture, gumboil, handle, hemangioma, hemorrhoids, hickey, hill, hump, hunch, indentation, jog, joggle, keloid, kibe, kink, knob, knot, knub, knur, knurl, lentigo, lesion, lip, loop, lump, milium, mole, mountain, nap, needle scar, nevus, nub, nubbin, nubble, papilloma, papula, papule, paronychia, parulis, peg, petechia, pile, piles, pimple, pit, pock, pockmark, polyp, port-wine mark, port-wine stain, protuberance, pustule, rib, ridge, rift, ring, rising, scab, scar, scratch, sebaceous cyst, shag, shoulder, soft chancre, sore, spine, split, stigma, strawberry mark, structure, stud, sty, style, suppuration, surface, surface texture, swelling, tab, texture, track, tubercle, tubercule, twist, ulcer, ulceration, verruca, vesicle, warp, wart, weal, weave, welt, wen, wheal, whelk, whelp, whitehead, whitlow, woof, wound