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Plow   /plaʊ/   Listen
noun
Plough, Plow  n.  
1.
A well-known implement, drawn by horses, mules, oxen, or other power, for turning up the soil to prepare it for bearing crops; also used to furrow or break up the soil for other purposes; as, the subsoil plow; the draining plow. "Where fern succeeds ungrateful to the plow."
2.
Fig.: Agriculture; husbandry.
3.
A carucate of land; a plowland. (Obs.) (Eng.) "Johan, mine eldest son, shall have plowes five."
4.
A joiner's plane for making grooves; a grooving plane.
5.
(Bookbinding) An implement for trimming or shaving off the edges of books.
6.
(Astron.) Same as Charles's Wain.
Ice plow, a plow used for cutting ice on rivers, ponds, etc., into cakes suitable for storing. (U. S.)
Mackerel plow. See under Mackerel.
Plow alms, a penny formerly paid by every plowland to the church.
Plow beam, that part of the frame of a plow to which the draught is applied. See Beam, n., 9.
Plow Monday, the Monday after Twelth Day, or the end of Christmas holidays.
Plow staff.
(a)
A kind of long-handled spade or paddle for cleaning the plowshare; a paddle staff.
(b)
A plow handle.
Snow plow, a structure, usually lambda-shaped, for removing snow from sidewalks, railroads, etc., drawn or driven by a horse or a locomotive.


verb
Plough, Plow  v. t.  (past & past part. plowed or ploughed; pres. part. plowing or ploughing)  
1.
To turn up, break up, or trench, with a plow; to till with, or as with, a plow; as, to plow the ground; to plow a field.
2.
To furrow; to make furrows, grooves, or ridges in; to run through, as in sailing. "Let patient Octavia plow thy visage up With her prepared nails." "With speed we plow the watery way."
3.
(Bookbinding) To trim, or shave off the edges of, as a book or paper, with a plow. See Plow, n., 5.
4.
(Joinery) To cut a groove in, as in a plank, or the edge of a board; especially, a rectangular groove to receive the end of a shelf or tread, the edge of a panel, a tongue, etc.
To plow in, to cover by plowing; as, to plow in wheat.
To plow up, to turn out of the ground by plowing.


Plough, Plow  v. i.  To labor with, or as with, a plow; to till or turn up the soil with a plow; to prepare the soil or bed for anything. "Doth the plowman plow all day to sow?"





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Plow" Quotes from Famous Books



... "Aristodemo," said the boy, looking, as he spoke the Greek name, "like to a god in form and stature." Mr. James's face lit up, and he walked over the historic ground beside the lad, Aristodemo picking up for him fragments of terra-cotta from the furrows through which the plow had just passed, bits of the innumerable small figurines that used to crowd the temple walls as ex-votos, and are now mingled with the fragole in the rich alluvial earth. It was a wonderful evening; with a golden sun on the lake, on the wide stretches where the temple stood, ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... elf-candles, dead-lights," etc., told him by one Jenny Wilson, an old woman who lived in the family. His ear was full of ancient Scottish tunes, and as soon as he fell in love he began to make poetry as naturally as a bird sings. He composed his verses while following the plow or working in the stack-yard; or, at evening, balancing on two legs of his chair and watching the light of a peat fire play over the reeky walls of the cottage. Burns's love songs are in many keys, ranging from strains of the most pure and exalted passion, like Ae Fond Kiss and ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... day and night, with an energy and a concentration he was capable of, to the learning and theory of his profession, and to the science of railroad building. He wrote some papers at this time for the "Plow, the Loom and the Anvil," upon the strength of materials, and especially upon bridge-building, which attracted considerable attention, and were copied into the English "Practical Magazine." They served ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 3. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... arriving at such a result, and no one can say, a priori, whether the forced cultivation of a given malarious tract will render it healthful. It must always be remembered that the first effect of forced cultivation, which requires an overturning of the soil by means of the plow, the spade, and the pick, is an unfortunate one, from a hygienic point of view, whenever we have to deal with a malarious country. Experience has shown, especially in Italy and America, that this overturning of the soil ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 458, October 11, 1884 • Various
... about the railroad was melodramatic. There were days when the town was completely shut off, when they had no mail, no express, no fresh meat, no newspapers. At last the rotary snow-plow came through, bucking the drifts, sending up a geyser, and the way to the Outside was open again. The brakemen, in mufflers and fur caps, running along the tops of ice-coated freight-cars; the engineers scratching frost from the cab windows and looking out, inscrutable, self-contained, pilots ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis


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