heave

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Contents

English [edit]

Etymology [edit]

From Middle English heven, hebben, from Old English hebban, from Proto-Germanic *habjaną (“to take up, lift”) (compare West Frisian heffe, Dutch heffen, German heben, Danish hæve), from Proto-Indo-European *kh₂pyé-, from the root *keh₂p- (compare Old Irish cáin 'law, tribute', cacht 'prisoner', Latin capiō 'to take', Latvian kàmpt 'to seize', Albanian kap (“I grasp, seize”), Ancient Greek κάπτω (káptō, “to gulp down”), κώπη (kṓpē, “handle”)).

Pronunciation [edit]

Verb [edit]

heave (third-person singular simple present heaves, present participle heaving, simple past heaved or, nautical, hove, past participle heaved or, nautical hove/ hoven)

  1. (transitive, archaic) To lift (generally); to raise, or cause to move upwards (particularly in ships or vehicles) or forwards.
  2. (transitive) To lift with difficulty; to raise with some effort; to lift (a heavy thing).
    We heaved the chest-of-doors on to the second-floor landing.
  3. (transitive, mining, geology) To displace (a vein, stratum).
  4. (transitive, now rare) To cause to swell or rise, especially in repeated exertions.
    The wind heaved the waves.
  5. (intransitive) To rise and fall.
    Her chest heaved with emotion.
  6. (transitive) To utter with effort.
    She heaved a sigh and stared out of the window.
  7. (transitive, now nautical) To throw, cast.
    The cap'n hove the body overboard.
  8. (transitive, nautical) To pull up with a rope or cable.
    Heave up the anchor there, boys!
  9. (intransitive, nautical) To move in a certain direction or into a certain position or situation.
    • 1914, Edgar Rice Burroughs, At the Earth's Core[1], The Gutenberg Project:
      The Sagoths were now not over two hundred and fifty yards behind us, and I saw that it was hopeless for us to expect to escape other than by a ruse. There was a bare chance of saving Ghak and Perry, and as I reached the branching of the canyon I took the chance. Pausing there I waited until the foremost Sagoth hove into sight. Ghak and Perry had disappeared around a bend in the left-hand canyon,
  10. (intransitive) To make an effort to vomit; to retch.
  11. (intransitive) To vomit.
    The smell of the old cheese was enough to make you heave.

Derived terms [edit]

Noun [edit]

heave (plural heaves)

  1. An effort to raise something, as a weight, or one's self, or to move something heavy.
    • 1749, John Cleland, Fanny Hill: Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure Part 2
      and now the bed shook, the curtains rattled so, that I could scarce hear the sighs and murmurs, the heaves and pantings that accompanied the action, from the beginning to the end
  2. An upward motion; a rising; a swell or distention, as of the breast in difficult breathing, of the waves, of the earth in an earthquake, and the like.
  3. A horizontal dislocation in a metallic lode, taking place at an intersection with another lode.
  4. (nautical) The measure of extent to which a nautical vessel goes up and down in a short period of time. Compare with pitch.

Translations [edit]

An effort to raise something, as a weight, or one's self, or to move something heavy
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