HEW (hewn)

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

Irregular inflected form: hewn   

 Dictionary entry overview: What does hew mean? 

• HEW (verb)
  The verb HEW has 2 senses:

1. make or shape as with an axe

2. strike with an axe; cut down, strike

  Familiarity information: HEW used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• HEW (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they hew    ... he / she / it hews   
Past simple: hewed   
Past participle: hewed    / hewn   
-ing form: hewing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Make or shape as with an axe

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

hew; hew out

Context example:

hew out a path in the rock

Hypernyms (to "hew" is one way to...):

carve (form by carving)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "hew"):

rough-hew; roughcast (hew roughly, without finishing the surface)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

hewer (a person who hews)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Strike with an axe; cut down, strike

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Context example:

hew an oak

Hypernyms (to "hew" is one way to...):

strike (deliver a sharp blow, as with the hand, fist, or weapon)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "hew"):

snag (hew jaggedly)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sentence example:

They hew the trees

Also:

hew out (make or shape as with an axe)

Derivation:

hewer (a person who hews)

 Context examples 

Draw thy sword, Thomas of Redbridge, and hew me his head from his shoulders.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

And there are obstacles in the way: they must be hewn down.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He has a noble palace, and a park of about three thousand acres, surrounded by a wall of hewn stone twenty feet high.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Inside the mill were twenty of the miller’s men hewing a stone, and as they went “Hick hack, hick hack, hick hack,” the mill went “Click clack, click clack, click clack.”

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Traddles reasonably supposed that this would settle the business; but I, only feeling that here indeed were a few tall trees to be hewn down, immediately resolved to work my way on to Dora through this thicket, axe in hand.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

He pointed as he spoke to a huge rough-hewn block which lay by the roadside, deep sunken from its own weight in the reddish earth.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It happened that the eldest wanted to go into the forest to hew wood, and before he went his mother gave him a beautiful sweet cake and a bottle of wine in order that he might not suffer from hunger or thirst.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

God has given us, in a measure, the power to make our own fate; and when our energies seem to demand a sustenance they cannot get—when our will strains after a path we may not follow—we need neither starve from inanition, nor stand still in despair: we have but to seek another nourishment for the mind, as strong as the forbidden food it longed to taste—and perhaps purer; and to hew out for the adventurous foot a road as direct and broad as the one Fortune has blocked up against us, if rougher than it.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Now the buildings of the outer court were at least five feet high, and it was impossible for me to stride over them without infinite damage to the pile, though the walls were strongly built of hewn stone, and four inches thick.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

There is filling of granges, hewing of wood, malting of grain, and herding of sheep as much as heart could wish, and I the only son.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)