delve

• IPA^(key): /dɛlv/

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -ɛlv

From Middle English delven, from Old English delfan (“to dig, dig out, burrow, bury”), from Proto-Germanic *delbaną (“to dig”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰelbʰ- (“to dig”). Cognate with West Frisian dolle (“to dig, delve”), Dutch delven (“to dig, delve”), Low German dölven (“to dig, delve”), dialectal German delben, telben (“to dig, delve”).

delve (third-person singular simple present delves, present participle delving, simple past delved or (obsolete) dolve, past participle delved or (archaic) dolven)

1. (intransitive) To dig into the ground, especially with a shovel.
   • 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. , London: Jacob Tonson, , →OCLC:

     Delve of convenient depth your thrashing floor.

   • 1847 December, Ellis Bell , Wuthering Heights: , volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Thomas Cautley Newby, , →OCLC:

     I got a spade from the tool-house, and began to delve with all my might—it scraped the coffin; I fell to work with my hands; the wood commenced cracking about the screws; I was on the point of attaining my object, when it seemed that I heard a sigh from some one above, close at the edge of the grave, and bending down.

   • 1866, C Kingsley, “Prelude. Of the Fens.”, in Hereward the Wake, “Last of the English.”  In Two Volumes.">…], volume I, London; Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 4:

     He finds out, soon enough for his weal and his bane, that he is stronger than Nature: and right tyrannously and irreverently he lords it over her, clearing, delving, dyking, building, without fear or shame.

   • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 209:

     With a grunt that rejected a disgraceful admission of poverty, Bradly delved up a shilling and a sixpence and showed them to her. "That's all I got left," he said, and tossed the coins dyspeptically away.

2. (ambitransitive) To search thoroughly and carefully for information, research, dig into, penetrate, fathom, trace out

   Synonyms: investigate, research

   • 1611 April (first recorded performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Cymbeline”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies  (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):

     I cannot delve him to the root.

   • 1943, Emile C. Tepperman, Calling Justice, Inc.!:

     She was intensely eager to delve into the mystery of Mr. Joplin and his brief case.

   • 1988 June, “Underground”, in Spin, page 32:

     Hampton delves into all sortsa cultural rootage — from country blues to smarmy Broadway show-tunage, combining them in a friendly, swinging way. This is the sorta record that should appeal to anybody who gave up on Zappa after Weasels Ripped My Flesh.

3. (ambitransitive) To dig; to excavate.

   • (please add an English translation of this quotation)]