noun

• (obsolete) A roughly spherical mass or body.
  "If the whole troupe be diuided into many clewes, or round bunches, you need not then doubt but that there are many kings."
• (archaic) A ball of thread or yarn.
  "[O]nely ſinne And helliſh obſtinacie tye thy tongue That truth ſhould be ſuſpected, ſpeake, iſ't ſo? If it be ſo, you haue wound a goodly clewe: If it be not, forſweare't how ere I charge thee, As heauen ſhall work in me for thine auaile To tell me truelie."
• (nautical) The lower corner(s) of a sail to which a sheet is attached for trimming the sail (adjusting its position relative to the wind); the metal loop or cringle in the corner of the sail, to which the sheet is attached. (on a triangular sail) The trailing corner relative to the wind direction.
  "'Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the crew, Hisses the rain of the rushing squall; The sails are aback from clew to clew, And now is the moment for "MAINSAIL, HAUL!""
• (in the plural) The sheets so attached to a sail.
  "The canvas running up in a proud sweep, Wind-wrinkled at the clews, and white like lint,"

verb

• (transitive) to roll into a ball
• (nautical, transitive, intransitive) to raise the lower corner(s) of (a sail)