From Middle English veyne, borrowed from Anglo-Norman veine, from Latin vēna of uncertain origin.

• enPR: vān, IPA: /veɪn/

vein (plural veins)

1. (anatomy) A blood vessel that transports blood from the capillaries back to the heart.

   Hyponyms: deep vein, perforator vein, superficial vein

   • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC ↗; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene vii ↗:

     An vncouth paine torments my grieued ſoule,
     And death arreſts the organe of my voyce.
     Who entring at the breach thy ſword hath made,
     Sackes euery vaine and artier of my heart, […]

2. (in plural) The entrails of a shrimp.
3. (botany) In leaves, a thickened portion of the leaf containing the vascular bundle.
4. (zoology) The nervure of an insect’s wing.
5. A stripe or streak of a different colour or composition in materials such as wood, cheese, marble or other rocks.
   1. (geology) A sheetlike body of crystallized minerals within a rock.
6. (figurative) A topic of discussion; a train of association, thoughts, emotions, etc.

   in the same vein

   • 1712, Jonathan Swift, A Proposal For Correcting, Improving, and Ascertaining the English Tongue:

     He […] is able to open new scenes, and discover a vein of true and noble thinking.

7. (figurative) A style, tendency, or quality.

   The play is in a satirical vein.

   • 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Truth”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC ↗:

     certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins

   • 1645, Edmund Waller, The Battle Of The Summer Islands:

     Invoke the Muses, and improve my vein.

8. A fissure, cleft or cavity, as in the earth or other substance.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book X”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC ↗; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC ↗:

     down to the veins of earth

   • 1704, I[saac] N[ewton], “(please specify |book=1 to 3)”, in Opticks: Or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light. […], London: […] Sam[uel] Smith, and Benj[amin] Walford, printers to the Royal Society, […], →OCLC ↗:

     I took another Prism therefore which was free from Veins

• (anatomy) vena

• venation
• venous

• French: veine
• German: Vene, Ader, Geäder (collective)
• Italian: vena
• Portuguese: veia
• Russian: ве́на
• Spanish: vena

• Italian: venatura
• Portuguese: nervura
• Russian: жи́лка
• Spanish: vena

• Russian: жи́лка
• Spanish: vena

• German: Ader, Goldader (gold)
• Portuguese: veio
• Russian: прожи́лка
• Spanish: vena

vein (veins, present participle veining; simple past and past participle veined)

1. To mark with veins or a vein-like pattern.
   • 1920, Melville Davisson Post, chapter 14, in The Sleuth of St. James’s Square‎:

     “We brought out our maps of the region and showed him the old routes and trails veining the whole of it. […] ”