penknife

nounB2+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #13,312 of 15,258leans spoken

Other forms: penknives

A penknife is a small folding blade carried in a pocket. A little penknife, open the penknife, whittle with a penknife.

The name is literal: it was the knife for cutting and shaping a quill pen, and a scribe sharpened one constantly. Carrying a folding blade under three inches is lawful in Britain, and anything longer or locking is not.

Definitions of penknife

1nounpenknifeA small folding blade carried in a pocket.B2+
“He cut the string with the penknife he always kept in his pocket.”

penknife is a knife.

Where it comes from

Pen plus knife, from the knife used to cut and trim a quill pen.

Middle English
penne knyfe
English, today
penknife

From Middle English penne knyfe; equivalent to pen + knife. In the original sense, named for its purpose: aiding the use of a (traditional) ink pen through the following tasks: trimming the tip of a quill pen, trimming a reed for a nib, and (in some cases) allowing erasure by scraping away some ink.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Camping & Outdoors

Practise this word

penknife in the wild

A penknife, or pen knife, is a small folding knife.
Penknife
The novel is about a young boy called Mees who has difficulty returning a penknife to his friend in another town.
Het Zakmes
A skeleton knife refers to two different types of knives, a kitchen knife and an unadorned penknife.
Skeleton knife
The supporting character of Hasnat, played by Jamshed Ansari, with his penknife, became popular.
Uncle Urfi
The possession of a Swiss Army penknife was a statement proclaiming, I am a boy.
Bertie Pollock

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

← Vocabulary