To ask with earnestness or importunity; to beseech; to implore; to ask with submission or humility, as a dependent; to beg; to entreat. As for my nobler friends, I crave their pardons. Joseph--went in boldly to Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus. Mark 15:43.

To call for, as a gratification; to long for; to require or demand, as a passion or appetite; as, the stomach or appetite craves food.

Sometimes intransitively, with for before the thing sought; as, I crave for mercy.