heave

From Middle English heven, hebben, from Old English hebban, from Proto-West Germanic *habbjan, from Proto-Germanic *habjaną (“to take up, lift”), from Proto-Indo-European *kh₂pyéti, from the root *keh₂p-. See also have.

• IPA^(key): /hiːv/

• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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• Rhymes: -iːv

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

1. (transitive) To lift with difficulty; to raise with some effort; to lift (a heavy thing).

   Synonyms: heft, upheave

   We heaved the chest-of-drawers up to the second-floor landing.

   He hove himself out of the bed.

2. (transitive) To throw, cast.

   Synonyms: fling, hurl; see also Thesaurus:throw

   They hove rocks into the pond.

   The cap'n hove the body overboard.

3. (intransitive) To rise and fall.

   Her chest heaved with emotion.

   • 1718, Mat Prior, “Solomon on the Vanity of the World. A Poem in Three Books.”, in Poems on Several Occasions, London: Jacob Tonson , and John Barber , →OCLC, (please specify the page):

     Frequent for breath his panting bosom heaves.

   • 1816, Lord Byron, “Canto III”, in Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. Canto the Third, London: Printed for John Murray, , →OCLC, stanza LXXII:

     the heaving plain of ocean

   • 1886 October – 1887 January, H Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     Presently the moon went down, and left us floating on the waters, now only heaving like some troubled woman's breast, with leisure to reflect upon all that we had gone through and all that we had escaped.

4. (transitive) To utter with effort.

   She hove a sigh and stared out of the window.

   • c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies  (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :

     The wretched animal heaved forth such groans.

5. (transitive, nautical) To pull up with a rope or cable.

   Synonyms: hoist, pulley, teagle

   Heave up the anchor there, boys!

6. (transitive, archaic) To lift (generally); to raise, or cause to move upwards (particularly in ships or vehicles) or forwards.
   • 1647–1648, Robert Herrick, “[Noble Numbers.] Another Grace for a Child.”, in Alexander B Grosart, editor, The Complete Poems of Robert Herrick.  (Early English Poets), volume III, London: Chatto and Windus, , published 1876, →OCLC, page 158:

     Here a little child I stand, / Heaving up my either hand; […]

7. (intransitive) To be thrown up or raised; to rise upward, as a tower or mound.

   Synonyms: mound, tower

   • 1715, Pope, The Temple of Fame: A Vision, London: Bernard Lintott , →OCLC, page 13:

     The grovving Tovv'rs like Exhalations riſe, / And the huge Columns heave into the Skies.

   • 1750 June 12 (date written; published 1751), T Gray, “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”, in Designs by Mr. R Bentley, for Six Poems by Mr. T. Gray, London: R Dodsley, , published 1753, →OCLC:

     where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap

   • 17 June, 1857, Edward Everett, The Statue of Warren

     the heaving sods of Bunker Hill

8. (transitive, mining, geology) To displace (a vein, stratum).
9. (transitive, archaic) To cause to swell or rise, especially in repeated exertions.

   The wind heaved the waves.

10. (transitive, intransitive, nautical) To move in a certain direction or into a certain position or situation.

    to heave the ship ahead

    • 1914 April 4–25, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Sly One”, in At the Earth’s Core, Chicago, Ill.: A C McClurg & Co., published 1922, →OCLC, page 209:

      Pausing there I waited until the foremost Sagoth hove into sight.

11. (intransitive) To retch, to make an effort to vomit; to vomit.

    Synonyms: throw up; see also Thesaurus:regurgitate

    The smell of the old cheese was enough to make you heave.

12. (intransitive) To make an effort to raise, throw, or move anything; to strain to do something difficult.

    Synonyms: labour, toil

    • 1687, Francis Atterbury, An Answer to Some Considerations on the Spirit of Martin Luther and the Original of the Reformation; , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Theater, →OCLC, page 64:

      She [The Church of England] had ſtruggl'd and heav'd at a Reformation; ever ſince Wicliffs dayes, for about a 150 years together: […]

13. (obsolete, British, thieves' cant) To rob; to steal from; to plunder.

    Synonyms: half-inch, mill; see also Thesaurus:steal

    • c. 1607–1610 (date written), Thomas Middleton; Thomas Dekker, The Roaring Girle. Or Moll Cut-purse. , London: [Nicholas Okes] for Thomas Archer, , published 1611, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:

      Ben mort (good vvench) ſhal you and I heaue a booth, mill a ken, or nip a bung? ſhall you and I rob a houſe, or cut a purſe?

• heavy
• heft

• → Danish: hive
• → Faroese: hiva
• → Norwegian Nynorsk: hiva, hive (e and split infinitives)
• → Norwegian Bokmål: hive
• → Scanian: hyva

  Hallandian: hiva

• → Swedish: hiva

  Sudermannian: hyva

heave (countable and uncountable, plural heaves)

1. (countable) An effort to raise something, such as a weight or one's own body, or to move something heavy.

   give something a heave

   • 2010, Andrea Levy, The Long Song, Tinder Press (2017), page 374:

     July made no reply but that of a sigh. For she was thinking of the heave she must make to see herself lifted from the ground.

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, etc.
   • 1749, [John Cleland], “(Please specify the letter or volume)”, in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure [Fanny Hill], London: for G. Fenton  , →OCLC:

     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

   • 2023 March 8, Chris Howe, “Building the platform for Old Oak Common's platforms”, in RAIL, number 978, page 60:

     The slab and piles will work together to resist 'ground heave' (the upward movement of the ground as it tries to push up into the box).

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.

   Coordinate term: pitch

5. An effort to vomit; retching.
6. (rare, only used attributively as in "heave line" or "heave horse") Broken wind in horses.
   • 1928, Farm Life - Volume 47, Issue 1, page 24:

     The dust would have to be watched out for with a heave horse, and most alfalfa hay...

   • 1988, New York State Veterinary College, Annual Conference for Veterinarians: Abstracts of Papers, page 14:

     The late stage is recognized by horse people as the true "heave" horse and at this stage most of the airways are partially or completely obstructed.

   • 2013, Lon D. Lewis, Feeding and Care of the Horse:

     The bay horse was straining at the time the picture was taken, making its heave line more noticeable.

7. (cricket) A forceful shot in which the ball follows a high trajectory
   • 2019 July 14, Stephan Shemilt, “England win Cricket World Cup: Ben Stokes stars in dramatic finale against New Zealand”, in BBC Sport‎, London:

     That left 15 needed from Boult's final set. Two dots were followed by a heave over deep mid-wicket, then came the outrageous moment of fortune.

• hevea