stoves

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of stove.

   The old farmhouse kitchen held a row of cast-iron stoves along one wall.

   Modern induction stoves heat pots without warming the surrounding air.

   Note

   A regular plural that carries every noun use of stove at once: room heaters, cooking appliances, stovetops, and the heated greenhouse that British usage also calls a stove. It covers the dated use for a room or house warmed by artificial heat as well. The same spelling serves as the present-tense verb form, so the rest of the sentence shows whether stoves names things or an action.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of stove.

   The falling beam stoves in the roof of the abandoned shed.

   A rogue wave stoves the dinghy against the pier with a splintering crack.

   Note

   Every verb use of stove goes into this form: heating or drying something as in a stove, keeping a room warm, or jamming and spraining. Watch the bare form stove, which also serves as the past tense of stave. That past has no -s form, so stoves always belongs to the present-tense verb stove, never to stave. In print it looks exactly like the plural noun.

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