Etymology Dictionary

RAKE (1),  an instrument for scraping things together, smoothing earth, &c.  (E.)   M.E. rake, Chaucer, C. T. 289.—A.S. raca, to translate Lat. rastrum in Ælfric's Gloss., l. 9. + Du. rakel, a dimin. form. + Icel. reka, a shovel. + Dan. rage, a poker. + Swed. raka, an oven-rake. + G. rechen, a rake.   Cf. Lat. ligo, a mattock.   β. From the notion of collecting or heaping up.   The root appears in Goth. rikan (pt. t. rak), to collect, heap up.   Rom. xii. 20; cognate with Lat. legere, Gk. λέγειν, to collect.—✔RAG, to collect.   See Legend.   Der. rake, verb, A.S. racian (Somner).

RAKE (2),  a wild, dissolute fellow.  (Scand.)   M.E. rakel, rash, Chaucer, C. T. 17238; Allit. Poems, C. 526.   [This word was corrupted into rake-hell; see Trench, Eng. Past and Present, and 4 examples in the additions to Nares by Halliwell and Wright.   And it was finally shortened to rake, as at present.   Levins has both rakyl, adj. rascally, and the corrupted form rakehell.   Rakehell was sometimes arbitrarily altered to rake-shame.   'Rake, or Rake-shame, a base rascally fellow;' Phillips, ed. 1710.]   β. The same word as Swed. dial. rakkel, a vagabond, connected with rakkla, to wander, rove, frequent. form of raka, to run hastily (Rietz).   Cf. O. Swed. racka, to run about; whence also O. Swed. racka, a kind of dog, M.E. rache.   So also Icel. reikall, wandering, unsettled, from reika, to wander; prov. E. rake, to wander.   Der. rak-ish, rak-ish-ly.

RAKE (3),  the projection of the extremities of a ship beyond the keel; the inclination of a mast from the perpendicular.  (Scand.)   'In sea-language, the rake of a ship is so much of her hull or main body, as hangs over both the ends of her keel;' Phillips, ed. 1710.   Evidently from rake, to reach; Halliwell.   Of Scand. origin; preserved in Swed. dial. raka, to reach; raka fram, to reach over, project, like Dan. rage, to project, protrude, jut out; see raka (3) in Rietz.   Rake is a doublet of E. reach, sb.   See Reach.   Doublet, reach.