Forms: 1 hweorfa, 5–7 wherve, (5, 7, 9 warve, 9 warf), 9. wharve. [OE. hweorfa = OHG. werbo, werfo wk. masc., werbâ wk. fem. rotating object, whirl, vortex:—*χwerƀon, f. χwerƀ-, as in OE. hweorfan, Goth. hwairban (see next).] The whorl of a spindle.
c. 1000. Sax. Leechd., II. 310. Wið ceoc adle, nim þone hweorfan þe wif mid spinnað.
14[?]. Lat.-Eng. Voc., in Wr.-Wülcker, 618/46. Vertebrum, a wherve, or a reele.
14[?]. Metr. Voc., ibid. 627. Colus cum fuso uertebrum [glossed warve, misprinted warbe] filum, alabrumque.
1538. Elyot, Spondilus, a wherue, whyche is a rounde thynge of stone, or wodde, or leadde, put on a spyndell to make it runne rounde.
1582. Stanyhurst, Æneis, etc., 95. Three wheru’s [orig. radios] fyerd glystring, with Soutwynds rufflered huffling.
1590. Barrough, Meth. Phisick, V. xxiv. (1596), 339. He did lay and bind vnto Ganglium, a thick round peece of lead like vnto a wherue.
1601. Holland, Pliny, XI. xxiv. I. 323. So fine … a thread she [sc. the spider] spinnes, hanging thereunto her selfe, and using the weight of her owne bodie in stead of a wherve.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. xxi. (Roxb.), 266/2. The Warve or small Pullas.
a. 1693. Urquhart’s Rabelais, III. xxviii. 237. Wouldst thou … blunt the Spindles, joynt the Wherves, slander the Spinning Quills,… of the weer’d Sister Parques?
1805. in Abridgm. Specif. Patents Spinning (1866), 125. The making the haft or warf at times to shift or remove from off the spindle. Ibid. (1831), 236. The warve is driven by a band passing round it and round the spindle drum.
1884. W. S. B. McLaren, Spinning (ed. 2), 171. The wharve, B, together with sliding tube, C, runs loosely on the spindle and carries the bobbin.
