sky

Less common meanings

4. 4
   hit ball highverbtransitive

   In ball games, to hit, kick, or throw a ball extremely high, often by mistake.

   The striker skied his shot over the crossbar in the final minute.

   Nervous players sky their penalties; calm ones pass the ball into the net.

   UsageThe ball or shot is the object: skied his shot, sky a penalty. The past is skied.

   Similarballoon, loft

   Note

   Reporters' shorthand whose tone depends on the game. In baseball a skied pitch becomes a high fly ball that can still do its job: Bobby Abreu skied one to left for a sacrifice fly. In soccer a skied penalty has sailed too high and missed, as Robin van Persie's did for Arsenal against Wigan in 2011. Source

   Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 2 facts

   • Bobby Abreu hit a high ball to left for a sacrifice fly. en.wiktionary.org
   • Robin van Persie missed a penalty by kicking it over the crossbar while playing for Arsenal against Wigan in 2011. theguardian.com
5. 5
   jump for ballverbcolloquialintransitive

   To leap very high into the air, especially to reach a ball in a sport such as basketball or soccer.

   Our center can sky above much taller players to pull down rebounds.

   The striker was skying above the defense to meet every cross.

   UsageThe player goes up: sky for a header. Skying a shot is different: it sends the ball too high.

   Similarleap, soar, rise, jump

6. 6
   verbintransitive

   To fly, or to move as fast as if flying; also, to get away or flee, especially by air.

   Similarfly, flee, bolt

7. 7
   clear a barverbtransitive

   In sports, to clear a high-jump bar, hurdle, or similar obstacle by a large margin.

   The favorite skied the opening height and waited for the bar to reach two meters.

   Hurdlers who sky every barrier lose time in the air.

   UsageThe obstacle is the object: sky the bar, sky a hurdle.

   Note

   Athletics turns the verb around: the athlete goes up, and the thing skied is the obstacle. A jumper skies the bar and a hurdler skies a hurdle, and the point is the size of the margin, not merely getting over.

8. 8
   drink by pouringverbcolloquialtransitive

   To pour a drink from a container into one's mouth without touching it with one's lips.

   My roommate gets mad if I don't sky the milk carton.

   At the festival, everyone shared one wineskin and learned to sky it without touching the spout.

   UsageThe object can be the container: sky the bottle, sky the carton.

9. 9
   raise oarverbintransitive

   In rowing, to raise an oar too high above the water.

   Rowers who sky before the catch lose the first inches of the stroke.

   From the launch, the rowing coach shouted that seat three was skying again, lifting her oar blade high above the water.

   Note

   In rowing, height counts as a fault rather than a feat: the blade comes up too far above the water before it goes in. In the high-jump use and the ball-game uses, height is the achievement or at least the event; here it is simply the mistake. Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

   • Skying in rowing is a fault involving the blade being too high above the water before entry. capitalcityrowing.org
   • The high-jump sense involves clearing a bar by a large margin; ball-game senses involve sending the ball extremely high. en.wiktionary.org
10. 10
    gallery topverbdatedtransitive

    To hang an exhibited picture high on a wall where it is hard to see, or put something somewhere undesirable.

    The artists—I mean the younger brood, and not the Brother Academicians who "skied" his pictures—were the first and the most enthusiastic in his [George Fuller's] praise.

    1883, M[ariana] G[riswold] Van Rensselaer, “George Fuller”

    Note

    An informal exhibition word for a snub: to sky a picture was to banish it to the gallery's top rows, where visitors could hardly see it. Mariana Van Rensselaer, writing in 1883, blames the Brother Academicians who skied George Fuller's pictures. Its counterpart was to floor a picture, hanging it near the bottom of the wall, which was hardly better. Source

    Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

    • Exhibited pictures described as skied were hung at the top of gallery walls, far from viewers. chronicle250.com
    • Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer's passage about George Fuller appeared in 1883. en.wiktionary.org
    • Van Rensselaer disparagingly refers to the Brother Academicians who skied Fuller's pictures. en.wiktionary.org
    • To floor an exhibited picture meant hanging it near the bottom of a wall, where visibility was poor; it was the counterpart of skying. en.wiktionary.org
11. 11
    verbdatedtransitive

    To toss something upward, in particular to flip a coin.

    Similartoss, flip

    Note

    Period slang with a ritual attached. C. Stoffel's Studies in English, Written and Spoken (1894) describes two methods then in vogue for "skying" a coin to settle a dispute, one of them the "slow torture" of spinning it three times. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact

    • Stoffel describes two contemporary methods of skying a coin to decide a dispute, including spinning it three times, which he calls “slow torture.” en.wiktionary.org
12. 12
    physicsnouncountable

    In mathematics and theoretical physics, the set of all lightlike lines or directions through a given point in space-time.

    The sky at a point is a sphere of directions, one for each incoming light ray.

    In the mathematics of space-time, the celestial sphere and the sky at a point are the same object.

    Note

    A geometer's version of looking up. At any event in space-time, the light rays passing through it form a set of directions, and that set is the sky of an observer there. Lightlike means moving at the speed of light, so this sky is built entirely from light paths. Its other name, the celestial sphere, hints at its shape. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts

    • An observer’s sky at an event is the set of lightlike directions there. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
    • Lightlike paths correspond to motion at the speed of light. arxiv.org
    • The observer’s sky is also called the celestial sphere. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
    • The sky has the topology of a sphere. arxiv.org
13. 13
    verbobsoletetransitive

    To drive up the price of an auction lot, or the bidding in general, by making high bids.

    Note

    An auction-room verb whose object is the lot or the price, never a ball. In Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne's novel The Wrecker (1892), a bidder who joins the contest late skies the Flying Scud by raising four times, a thousand dollars at a go, and then abruptly drops out. Source

    Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

    • In the auction sense, sky means to raise the price of a lot or the bidding, rather than to hit a ball. en.wiktionary.org
    • The Wrecker is a novel jointly written by Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne. en.wikipedia.org
    • The Wrecker first appeared in book form in 1892. upload.wikimedia.org
    • A late-entering bidder raises the bidding for the Flying Scud four times by a thousand dollars each, then abruptly stops bidding. en.wikisource.org
14. 14
    nounobsolete

    In a picture gallery, the upper rows of pictures that cannot easily be seen, or the place where they hang.

    Note

    Gallery insiders used this word for the spot no painter wanted: the upper rows, where a picture could hardly be seen. The idea lives on in the verb to sky, which means hanging a picture out of view. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

    • Sky denoted the upper picture rows in a gallery, or their position, where pictures were difficult to see. en.wiktionary.org
    • Artists disliked having their pictures hung in these high positions. chronicle250.com
    • The related verb means hanging a picture high on a wall where it is difficult to see. en.wiktionary.org
15. 15
    nounobsolete

    A cloud.

    Note

    The word's starting point, long obsolete: the Norse cloud behind the everyday overhead sense. In modern English a sky is never a single cloud. When a phrase in an old text makes no sense as the vault overhead, try reading it as a cloud instead. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 2 facts

    • Sky originally meant a cloud and derives from Old Norse, whose word had that meaning. edoc.ku.de
    • The cloud sense is obsolete and can explain occurrences in old texts. en.wiktionary.org
16. 16
    nounobsoleteUK

    Among pupils of Westminster School, a disagreeable person or an enemy.

    Note

    A separate word that only shares the spelling. It comes from the Volsci, a tribe who opposed the Romans, and it belonged to the slang of Westminster School in England. To call someone a sky was to cast them as an old enemy of Rome, a joke suited to a Latin-trained schoolroom. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 6 facts

    • This is a separate etymological word, derived from Volsci. en.wiktionary.org
    • The Volsci were a tribe opposed to Rome. en.wikipedia.org
    • Sky belonged to Westminster School slang and meant a disagreeable person or enemy. en.wiktionary.org
    • Westminster School is in England. en.wikipedia.org
    • The nickname cast the pupils as Romans and their opponents as Volscians. dl.tufts.edu
    • Westminster pupils received training in Latin. dl.tufts.edu