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Ream vs Teem - What's the difference?

ream | teem |

As a noun ream

is ream (of paper).

As a verb teem is

to be stocked to overflowing or teem can be (archaic) to empty or teem can be (obsolete|rare) to think fit.

ream

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) reme, rem, from (etyl) . See also (l).

Alternative forms

* (l), (l)

Noun

(en noun)
  • Cream; also, the creamlike froth on ale or other liquor; froth or foam in general.
  • Verb

    (en verb)
  • To cream; mantle; foam; froth.
  • * Sir Walter Scott
  • a huge pewter measuring pot which, in the language of the hostess, reamed with excellent claret

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) remen, rimen, . More at (l).

    Alternative forms

    * (l), (l), (l)

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To enlarge a hole, especially using a reamer; to bore a hole wider.
  • To shape or form, especially using a reamer.
  • To remove (material) by reaming.
  • To remove burrs and debris from a freshly bored hole.
  • (slang) To yell at or berate.
  • (slang, vulgar) To sexually penetrate in a rough and painful way, by analogy with definition 1.
  • Etymology 3

    From (etyl) reeme, from (etyl) raime, .

    Alternative forms

    * (l)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A bundle, package, or quantity of paper, nowadays usually containing 500 sheets.
  • An abstract large amount of something.
  • I can't go - I still have reams of work left.
    Coordinate terms
    * (quantity of paper) bale, bundle, quire

    See also

    *

    Anagrams

    * ----

    teem

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) , whence also team.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To be stocked to overflowing.
  • * Sir Walter Scott
  • his mind teeming with schemes of future deceit to cover former villainy
  • To be prolific; to abound.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-22, volume=407, issue=8841, page=76, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Snakes and ladders , passage=Risk is everywhere. From tabloid headlines insisting that coffee causes cancer (yesterday, of course, it cured it) to stern government warnings about alcohol and driving, the world is teeming with goblins.}}
  • To bring forth young, as an animal; to produce fruit, as a plant; to bear; to be pregnant; to conceive; to multiply.
  • * Shakespeare
  • If she must teem , / Create her child of spleen.

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) (m), from (etyl) .

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (archaic) To empty.
  • * 1913 ,
  • *:“Are you sure they’re good lodgings?” she asked.
  • *:“Yes—yes. Only—it’s a winder when you have to pour your own tea out—an’ nobody to grouse if you team it in your saucer and sup it up. It somehow takes a’ the taste out of it.”
  • To pour (especially with rain)
  • To pour, as steel, from a melting pot; to fill, as a mould, with molten metal.
  • Etymology 3

    See tame (adjective) and compare beteem.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete, rare) To think fit.
  • Anagrams

    * meet * mete ----