Other forms: skeins
A skein is a loosely coiled length of yarn. A skein of wool, wind the skein, two skeins short.
It is sold twisted rather than balled and must be wound before use, since knitting straight from a skein tangles it hopelessly. A skein is also the word for geese in flight, as against a gaggle on the ground.
1nounskeinA loosely coiled length of yarn.
“She bought three skeins of blue wool to knit a scarf.”
skein is a coil.
Old French escaigne names the coil of yarn, of uncertain further origin.
Proto-Indo-European
*skend- — to split off
Old French
escaigne
Middle English
skaine
English, today
skein
Built from
The is derived from Middle English skaine, skayne (“quantity of string, thread, etc., wound on a reel; the string, thread, etc., so wound”), from Old French escaigne (modern French écagne, écaigne Picardy); further etymology uncertain, probably from Proto-Celtic -, from Proto-Indo-European skend- (“to split off”). The is derived from noun. 2
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA