rave - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

• enPR: rāv, IPA^(key): /ɹeɪv/
• Rhymes: -eɪv

From Middle English raven (“to rave; talk like a madman”), from Old French raver, variant of resver, of uncertain origin. Compare rove.

rave (countable and uncountable, plural raves)

1. (informal, countable) An enthusiastic review (such as of a play).

   Synonym: raving review

   • 1989, The New York Times Theater Reviews, 1920-, volume 18, page 167:

     The first-night audience, yes. The first-night reviewers, not exactly. The notices have so far been mixed, only The Financial Times having delivered itself of an unequivocal rave.

2. An all-night dance party with electronic dance music (techno, trance, drum and bass etc.) in small unknown clubs.

   Synonym: rave-up

3. (music, uncountable) The genres of electronic dance music made to be played in rave parties.

   • 2009, Chrysalis Experiential Academy, Mind Harvesting, page 109:

     Maybe I wear baggies / And white socks with flip-flops / Maybe I don't like listening to rave / And I'm not on the social mountaintops

• → Finnish: reivit (pl)

rave (third-person singular simple present raves, present participle raving, simple past and past participle raved)

1. (intransitive) To be mentally unclear; to be delirious; to talk or act irrationally; to be wild, furious, or raging.

   • 1712 (date written), [Joseph] Addison, Cato, a Tragedy. […], London: […] J[acob] Tonson, […], published 1713, →OCLC, Act I, scene iv, page 1:

     Have I not cause to rave and beat my breast?
2. (intransitive) To speak or write wildly or incoherently.
3. (intransitive, followed by "about", "of" or (formerly) "on") To talk with excessive enthusiasm, passion or excitement.

   He raved about her beauty.

   • 1812, Lord Byron, “Canto I”, in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. A Romaunt, London: Printed for John Murray, […]; William Blackwood, Edinburgh; and John Cumming, Dublin; by Thomas Davison, […], →OCLC, stanza LXII:

     The hallowed scene / Which others rave on, though they know it not.
4. (obsolete) To rush wildly or furiously.^[1]
5. (intransitive) To attend a rave (dance party).

   • 2021, Samantha Durbin, Raver Girl: Coming of Age in the 90s:

     The situation with Tommy's parents made me grateful my parents hadn't caught on to my partying that summer. How had I gotten away with raving every weekend, and sometimes on Thursday nights too?

• rant and rave

• → Finnish: reivata

• rant

English dialect raves, or rathes (“a frame laid on a wagon, for carrying hay, etc.”).

This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

rave (plural raves)

1. (Can we verify⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) One of the upper side pieces of the frame of a wagon body or a sleigh.^[2]

rave

1. (obsolete) simple past of rive

• AVRE, Vera, aver, evar, vare, vera

Inherited from Old Catalan rave, from Latin raphănus, borrowed from Ancient Greek ῥάφανος (rháphanos).^[1] The medieval plural ravens (with retention of etymological /n/) survives in western Catalan dialects and Valencian.^[2]

• IPA^(key): (Central) [ˈra.βə]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [ˈra.və]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [ˈra.ve]

rave m (plural raves or ravens)

1. radish
2. (figurative) trifle (thing of little importance or worth)

• “rave” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “rave” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.

• IPA^(key): /raːvə/, [ˈʁɑːwə]

rave (imperative rav, infinitive at rave, present tense raver, past tense ravede, perfect tense har ravet)

1. reel
2. stagger, totter, lurch

• IPA^(key): /reːf/

Borrowed from English rave.

rave m (plural raves, diminutive raveje n)

1. rave (electronic dance party)

   Kom je vanavond naar de rave in het bos? ― Are you coming to the rave in the forest tonight?

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

rave

1. inflection of raven:
   1. first-person singular present indicative
   2. (in case of inversion) second-person singular present indicative
   3. imperative
   4. (dated or formal) singular present subjunctive

• vare

Borrowed from Franco-Provençal râva.

• IPA^(key): /ʁav/

rave m (plural raves)

1. beet, turnip
2. (mining) miner's lamp

Borrowed from English rave.

• IPA^(key): /ʁɛv/
• Homophone: rêve

rave m (plural raves)

1. rave party

   Synonym: rave party

• “rave”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• rêva

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈraː.u̯e/, [ˈräːu̯ɛ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈra.ve/, [ˈräːve]

rāve

1. vocative masculine singular of rāvus

• "rave", in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

rave

1. Alternative form of reif

Unadapted borrowing from English rave.

rave f (plural raves)

1. rave (party)

• festa

• “rave”, in iDicionário Aulete (in Portuguese), Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon Editora Digital, 2008–2025
• “rave”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2025

Unadapted borrowing from English rave.

• IPA^(key): /ˈreib/ [ˈrei̯β̞]
• Rhymes: -eib

rave f (plural raves)

1. rave (party)

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

• rejv

rave n

1. rave (all-night dance party with electronic music, or the associated culture)

   Synonym: (rave party) raveparty

• rejva
• rejvare

• rave in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• rave in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)

rave

1. plural of rava