Skate (?), n. [D. schaats. Cf. Scatches.] A metallic runner with a frame shaped to fit the sole of a shoe, -- made to be fastened under the foot, and used for moving rapidly on ice.

Batavia rushes forth; and as they sweep, On sounding skates, a thousand different ways, In circling poise, swift as the winds, along, The then gay land is maddened all to joy. Thomson.

Roller skate. See under Roller.

Skate , v. i. [imp. & p. p. Skated; p. pr. & vb. n.Skating.] To move on skates.

Skate , n. [Icel. skata; cf. Prov. G. schatten, meer-schatten, L. squatus, squatina, and E. shad.] (Zoöl.) Any one of numerous species of large, flat elasmobranch fishes of the genus Raia, having a long, slender tail, terminated by a small caudal fin. The pectoral fins, which are large and broad and united to the sides of the body and head, give a somewhat rhombic form to these fishes. The skin is more or less spinose.

☞ Some of the species are used for food, as the European blue or gray skate (Raia batis), which sometimes weighs nearly 200 pounds. The American smooth, or barn-door, skate (R. lævis) is also a large species, often becoming three or four feet across. The common spiny skate (R. erinacea) is much smaller.

"Skates egg. See Sea purse. -- Skate sucker, any marine leech of the genus Pontobdella, parasitic on skates."

-- Webster's unabridged 1913