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thrave

Farming
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

thrave: A traditional agricultural measure of grain, typically twenty-four sheaves, representing the cycles of harvest, communal labor, and rural economy.

Detailed Definition
A thrave is an old agricultural measure for a set of sheaves of grain. In the poem it helps specify the mouse’s tiny theft as a very small portion of a harvest.
Example
Example in poetry:
A Scots “thrave” is a counted bundle of sheaves, commonly twenty-four, in “A daimen-icker in a thrave”; “Three thraves stood drying” makes harvest labor measurable; The farming term gives a poem precise local texture; Counting sheaves can also emphasize plenty, wages, or seasonal work
Additional Notes
“thrave” is an old farming term in the line and is specialized rather than everyday vocabulary.; Found in the poem, To a Mouse by Robert Burns
Also Known As
bundle sheaf cluster
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