[f. the sb.]
1. trans. To furnish or provide with spokes or bars; to mark with spoke-like lines or rays.
1720. Pope, Iliad, XXI. 45. As from a sycamore, his sounding steel Loppd the green arms to spoke a chariot-wheel.
1756. Mrs. Calderwood, in Coltness Coll. (Maitl. Club), 122. Just by the water-pump there was a crib [for chickens] fixt about a yard from the ground; it was spoked in the bottom, so that the filth fell through.
1839. Hawthorne, Transform., xlix. A triumphal car, its slow-moving wheels encircled and spoked with foliage.
1890. R. Bridges, Shorter Poems, II. 5. The white water-lily spoked with gold.
2. To thrust a spoke into (a wheel, etc.) in order to check movement; fig. to block, impede or obstruct.
1854. Miss Baker, Northampt. Gloss., s.v., Spoke your cart is a phrase of similar significancy.
1896. Daily News, 4 June, 5/4. Six pages of amendments skilfully handled are sufficient to spoke the wheels of any private Bill.
3. To drive or force (a wheel or vehicle) forward by pushing the spokes.
1860. Chamberss Jrnl., XIV. 236. Those under the vehicle can spoke the wheels forward.
1882. E. ODonovan, Merv Oasis, I. iii. 54. The waggons, often down to the axle [in water], had to be forcibly spoked forward by the men.