plough

• plow (American)

From Middle English plouh, plow, plugh(e), plough(e), plouw, from Old English plōh (“hide of land, ploughland”) and Old Norse plógr (“plough (the implement)”), both from Proto-Germanic *plōgaz, *plōguz (“plough”). Cognate with Scots pleuch, plou, West Frisian ploech, North Frisian plog, Dutch ploeg, Low German Ploog, German Pflug, Danish plov, Swedish and Norwegian plog, Icelandic plógur. Replaced Old English sulh (“plough, furrow”); see sullow.

• IPA^(key): /plaʊ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aʊ

plough (plural ploughs)

1. A device pulled through the ground in order to break it open into furrows for planting.

   The horse-drawn plough had a tremendous impact on agriculture.

2. The use of a plough; tillage.
   • 1919, Commonwealth Shipping Committee, Report (volume 8, page 47)

     If you get it early ploughed and it lies all winter possibly, you find it an advantage to give it a second plough; but it does not invariably follow that we plough twice for our green crop.

3. Alternative form of Plough (Synonym of Ursa Major)
   • 2004, Amazing Physics Quiz, →ISBN, page 32:

     Rising in the north-east fairly high in the sky, Arcturus may be found by following round the curve of the plough.

   • 2005, Clive L. N. Ruggles, Ancient Astronomy: An Encyclopedia of Cosmologies and Myth, →ISBN:

     To many generations of rice farmers in rural Java, Indonesia, it was not the stars of Ursa Major that formed the plough, but the stars of Orion.

   • 2007, Mike Lynch, Florida Starwatch, →ISBN, page 52:

     Across the Atlantic, what we call the Big Dipper has been called many other names. In England, this grouping of stars is seen as the plough.

   • 2010, John Turner, Exploring the Other Island: A Seasonal Guide to Nature on Long Island, →ISBN:

     Consider the Big Dipper, or as it is also known, the plough or the wagon.

4. Alternative form of ploughland, an alternative name for a carucate or hide.
   • Tale of Gamelyn

     Johan, mine eldest son, shall have plowes five.

5. A joiner's plane for making grooves.
6. A bookbinder's implement for trimming or shaving off the edges of books.

The spelling plow is usual in the United States, but the spelling plough may be found in literary or historical contexts there.

• (device): sull, zowl (English dialects)
• (unit of area): See carucate

• (unit of area): See carucate

• (device): ard, light plough, scratch plough; carruca, heavy plough, mouldboard plough, turnplough
• (unit of area): See carucate

plough (third-person singular simple present ploughs, present participle ploughing, simple past and past participle ploughed)

1. (transitive) To use a plough on to prepare for planting.

   I've still got to plough that field.

2. (intransitive) To use a plough.

   Some days I have to plough from sunrise to sunset.

3. (transitive, vulgar) To have sex with.
4. To move with force.

   Trucks plowed through the water to ferry flood victims to safety.

   • 2011 January 18, “Wolverhampton 5 - 0 Doncaster”, in BBC‎:

     Wolves continued to plough forward as young Belgian midfielder Mujangi Bia and Ronald Zubar both hit shots wide from good positions.

5. To furrow; to make furrows, grooves, or ridges in.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Shakespeare

     Let patient Octavia plough thy visage up / With her prepared nails.

6. (nautical) To run through, as in sailing.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Alexander Pope

     With speed we plough the watery way.

7. (bookbinding) To trim, or shave off the edges of, as a book or paper, with a plough.
8. (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.
9. (Britain, universities, slang, transitive) To fail (a student).
   • 1863, Kingsley, Henry, Austin Elliot, page 123:

     The good Professor scolded, predicted that they would all be either gulfed or ploughed.

• disc
• furrow
• harrow
• rake
• till
• yoke