graff

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɡɹɑːf/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (US, Northern England) IPA^(key): /ɡɹæf/
• Rhymes: -ɑːf, -æf
• Homophones: graph

Older variant of graft, q.v.

graff (plural graffs)

1. (botany, archaic) Alternative form of graft.

graff (third-person singular simple present graffs, present participle graffing, simple past and past participle graffed)

1. (botany, archaic) Alternative form of graft.
   • 1653-1694, Thomas Urquhart, Peter Anthony Motteux, Gargantua and Pantagruel‎^[1], translation of original by Francois Rabelais, Book IV:

     Truly, said Pantagruel, if I live to go home--which I hope will be speedily, God willing--I'll set off and graff some in my garden in Touraine, by the banks of the Loire, and will call them bon-Christian or good-Christian pears, for I never saw better Christians than are these good Papimans.

   • 1823, William Stewart Rose, Orlando Furioso‎^[2], translation of original by Ludovico Ariosto:

     For where men look for fruit they graff the tree, And study still the rising plant to train; And artist uses to refine the gold Designed by him the precious gem to hold.

From German Graf (“count”).

graff (uncountable)

1. (obsolete) A steward; an overseer.

• graf

graff (uncountable)

2. (slang) Clipping of graffiti.

• graffer

graff (third-person singular simple present graffs, present participle graffing, simple past and past participle graffed)

1. (slang) Clipping of graffiti

   Synonym: graff up

   • 2011 March 18, Mary A. Monroe, “The Long Drive”, in Tagger: Graffiti Was His Life – and Soul, Bloomington, Ind.: AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 49:

     Just two days ago, I had graffed a piece with my crew and went to Sunrise High School.

   • 2014, Beth Kephart, “SO36”, in Going Over, San Francisco, Calif.: Chronicle Books, →ISBN, page 9:

     There’s nothing like heat in this light. There’s only what I’m graffing—the swirls and orbs and flecks and tags, the pictures I’m making for Stefan.

   • 2019, George F., “Down with the Shitness”, in Good Times in Dystopia, New Alresford, Hampshire: Zero Books, →ISBN:

     Whilst living in Squatopolis, I remember returning home with a bag of sweaty skip, and finding him graffing a huge piece on to one wall: the squat logo being smashed with a fist surrounded by the words “Better Let Homes Rot Than Squat”.

graff (plural graffs)

1. (slang, journalism) Alternative form of graf (“paragraph”).
   • 2008 September 19, Ta-Nehisi Coates, “Why is Hollywood ignoring She-Hulk?”, in The Atlantic‎^[3]:

     Were I not hooked-up, and old enough to be her father, I'd be stalking Alyssa Rosenberg because of the following graff: […]

graff m (plural graffs)

1. (slang) clipping of graffiti

• graffer

From Middle High German grof, northern variant of grop, from Proto-Germanic *grubaz. Cognate with German grob, Dutch grof. The form graff, graffen is generalised from the uninflected stem; the inflected stem yielded gruef, gruewen, which is attested dialectally (but had the disadvantage of merging with the verb gruewen (“to dig”)).

• IPA^(key): /ɡraf/, [ɡʀɑf]
• Rhymes: -ɑf

graff (masculine graffen, neuter grafft, comparative méi graff, superlative am graffsten)

1. rough, coarse
2. coarse, vulgar, crude
3. rugged, hard-wearing

Borrowing from English graph.

• IPA^(key): /ɡraf/
• Rhymes: -af

graff m (plural graffau or graffiau)

1. graph (mathematical diagram)

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

• IPA^(key): /ɡraːf/

graff

1. soft mutation of craff