Definition of "vein"

vein

/veɪn/

noun
plural veins
1. (anatomy) A blood vessel that transports blood from the capillaries back to the heart.
  Quotations
  An vncouth paine torments my grieued ſoule,And death arreſts the organe of my voyce.Who entring at the breach thy ſword hath made,Sackes euery vaine and artier of my heart, […]
  c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, Act II, scene vii
2. (in the plural) The entrails of a shrimp.
3. (botany) In leaves, a thickened portion of the leaf containing the vascular bundle.
4. (zoology) The nervure of an insect’s wing.
5. A stripe or streak of a different colour or composition in materials such as wood, cheese, marble or other rocks.
  1. (geology) A sheetlike body of crystallized minerals within a rock.
6. (figurative) A topic of discussion; a train of association, thoughts, emotions, etc.
  Quotations
  He […] is able to open new scenes, and discover a vein of true and noble thinking.
  1712, Jonathan Swift, A Proposal For Correcting, Improving, and Ascertaining the English Tongue
  Come ride with meThrough the veins of history,I'll show you how GodFalls asleep on the job
  2006, Matt Bellamy (lyrics and music), “Knights of Cydonia”, in Black Holes and Revelations, performed by Muse
7. (figurative) A style, tendency, or quality.
  Quotations
  certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins
  1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Truth”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret
  Invoke the Muses, and improve my vein.
  1645, Edmund Waller, The Battle Of The Summer Islands
8. A fissure, cleft, or cavity, as in the earth or other substance.
  Quotations
  down to the veins of earth
  1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […]; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873,
  I took another Prism therefore which was free from Veins
  1704, I[saac] N[ewton], “(please specify |book=1 to 3)”, in Opticks: Or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light. […], London: […] Sam[uel] Smith, and Benj[amin] Walford, printers to the Royal Society, […]
verb
third-person singular simple present veins, present participle veining, simple past and past participle veined
1. To mark with veins or a vein-like pattern.
  Quotations
  […] as he ceased from that wild imprecation, a faint flash of lightning veined the remote horizon, and a low clap of thunder rumbled afar off, echoing among the hills […]
  1853, Henry William Herbert, chapter 18, in The Roman Traitor‎, volume II, Philadelphia: T.B. Peterson, page 204
  “We brought out our maps of the region and showed him the old routes and trails veining the whole of it. […] ”
  1920, Melville Davisson Post, chapter 14, in The Sleuth of St. James’s Square‎

Definition of "vein"

vein

noun

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verb

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