See Also: plough(medicine)
plough(1)(dictionary)
plough(2)(dictionary)
Plough(dictionary)
PLOUGH-LAND, old Eng(law)
PLOUGH-BOTE(law)
snow plough(dictionary)
plough 2, verb(dictionary)
plough 1, noun(dictionary)
trench-plough(dictionary)

plough(1) (iou)



plough noun. Also (now arch. & N. Amer.) plow. LOE.
[Old Norse plogr = Old Frisian ploch, Old Saxon plog (Dutch ploeg), Old High German pfluoc (German Pflug), from Germanic from north. Italic word, repr. by Lombardic Latin plovus, Rhaetian plaumatorum, and prob. Latin plaustrum, plostrum, ploxenum, -inum. The native Old English word was sulh (rel. to Latin sulcus furrow). In branch II from the verb.]
I.
a. = PLOUGH-LAND 1. obsolete exc. Hist. LOE.
D. Hume Ecclesiastical revenues which..contained eighteen thousand four hundred ploughs of land.
b. = PLOUGH-LAND 2. M19.
P. Wayre The rabbit..its white scut bouncing across the open plough.
a. A team of horses, oxen, etc., harnessed to a plough. Chiefly Scot. LOE.
b. A team of draught animals harnessed to a cart or wagon; such a team with its cart or wagon. Chiefly dial. E16.
W. Borlase The driver of a plough..laden with tin.
An agricultural implement with a cutting blade fixed in a frame drawn by a tractor or by draught animals, used to prepare the soil for sowing or planting by cutting furrows in it and turning it up. Freq. preceded by specifying word. ME.
breast plough, foot plough, swing plough, wheel plough, etc. follow the plough be a ploughman. put one's hand to the plough, set one's hand to the plough (in allus. to Luke 9:62) undertake a task; enter on a course of life or conduct. under the plough (of land) in cultivation.
P. S. Buck The deep curl of earth turning as the plough went into the soil. M. Pyke The land was tilled by means of a primitive plough.
(Usu. Plough.) (The name of) a distinctive group of seven bright stars in Ursa Major, two of which give a line to the polestar; also called Charles's Wain, Dipper, Big Dipper, Great Dipper. Also, Ursa Major. ME.
K. Grahame Dominant amidst the Population of the Sky..hangs the great Plough.
Any of various implements or mechanical parts resembling an agricultural plough in structure or function; spec. (a) Bookbinding a device for cutting or trimming the edges of a book; (b) a plane for cutting rabbets or grooves; (c) an implement for deflecting material against which it moves or which moves against it, esp. a snowplough; (d) Mining a machine with cutting blades for removing a thin strip of coal when hauled along a coalface. L17.
SNOWPLOUGH noun.
Yoga. A position assumed by lying on one's back and swinging the legs over one's head until the feet approach or touch the floor. E20.
II.
The action of rejecting a candidate as not reaching the pass standard in an examination; the fact of being thus rejected; an instance of this. colloq. M19.
C. Reade It is only out of Oxford a plough is thought much of.
Comb.: plough-alms Hist. a due payable to the Church in Anglo-Saxon and feudal times, consisting of one penny per annum for each plough or plough-land; plough-beam the central longitudinal beam or bar of timber or iron in a plough, to which the other principal parts are attached; ploughbote Hist. wood or timber which a tenant had a right to cut for making and repairing ploughs and other agricultural implements; plough-boy a boy who leads the animals drawing a plough; plough-bullock (a) a bullock used in ploughing; (b) (chiefly Hist.) a participant in the celebration of Plough Monday; plough-driver a person who drives the animals drawing a plough; plough-foot (a) see FOOT noun 9; (b) = plough-staff below; plough-gate Scot. & north. (now Hist.) (a) = PLOUGH-LAND 1; (b) a much smaller quantity of land; plough-gear, (Scot.) plough-graith collect. harness and equipment for a plough; plough grinding a method of grinding and sharpening to a bevelled edge wires used in cotton spinning; plough-ground adjective produced by plough grinding; plough-handle the handle, or either of two handles, of a plough; plough-head (a) the share-beam of a plough; (b) the front part of a plough; plough-iron an iron part of a plough; spec. in pl., the coulter and share collectively; plough-jogger arch., joc. & derog. a person who pushes a plough; a ploughman; plough-line (a) the line marking the limit of ploughed land; (b) cord used for the reins of a plough; in pl., the reins of a plough; Plough Monday the first Monday after Epiphany, on which the start of the ploughing season was traditionally celebrated by a procession of disguised ploughmen and boys drawing a plough from door to door; plough pan a compacted layer in cultivated soil resulting from repeated ploughing; plough-pattle, plough-pettle Scot. & north. = plough-staff below; plough-point the (freq. detachable) point of a ploughshare; US the first (often detachable) share at the front of a plough; plough-press Bookbinding a press in which a book is held while the edges are cut; plough-shoe any of various appliances for covering, protecting, or supporting a ploughshare; plough-soil soil thrown up by ploughing; plough-staff a staff, ending in a small spade or shovel, for clearing the coulter and mould-board of earth, roots, weeds, etc.; plough-stilt (obsolete exc. Scot. & dial.) a plough-handle; plough-stock (chiefly US) the iron or metal frame of a plough; plough-stot (chiefly Hist.) = plough-bullock (b) above; plough-tail the rear or handles of a plough; at the plough-tail, following the plough (lit. & fig.); plough-wright a maker of ploughs.