Dig , v. i.

1. To work with a spade or other like implement; to do servile work; to delve.

Dig for it more than for hid treasures. Job iii. 21.

I can not dig; to beg I am ashamed. Luke xvi. 3.

2. (Mining) To take ore from its bed, in distinction from making excavations in search of ore.

3. To work like a digger; to study ploddingly and laboriously. [Cant, U.S.]

Dig (dĭg), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Dug (dŭg) or Digged (dĭgd); p. pr. & vb. n. Digging. -- Digged is archaic.] [OE. diggen, perh. the same word as diken, dichen (see Dike, Ditch); cf. Dan. dige to dig, dige a ditch; or (?) akin to E. 1st dag. √67.]

1. To turn up, or delve in, (earth) with a spade or a hoe; to open, loosen, or break up (the soil) with a spade, or other sharp instrument; to pierce, open, or loosen, as if with a spade.

Be first to dig the ground. Dryden.

2. To get by digging; as, to dig potatoes, or gold.

3. To hollow out, as a well; to form, as a ditch, by removing earth; to excavate; as, to dig a ditch or a well.

4. To thrust; to poke. [Colloq.]

You should have seen children . . . dig and push their mothers under the sides, saying thus to them: Look, mother, how great a lubber doth yet wear pearls. Robynson (Mores Utopia).

To dig down, to undermine and cause to fall by digging; as, to dig down a wall. -- To dig from, out of, out, or up, to get out or obtain by digging; as, to dig coal from or out of a mine; to dig out fossils; to dig up a tree. The preposition is often omitted; as, the men are digging coal, digging iron ore, digging potatoes. -- To dig in, to cover by digging; as, to dig in manure.

Dig , v. i.

1. To work hard or drudge; specif. (U. S.): To study ploddingly and laboriously. [Colloq.]

Peter dug at his books all the harder. Paul L. Ford.

2. (Mach.) Of a tool: To cut deeply into the work because ill set, held at a wrong angle, or the like, as when a lathe tool is set too low and so sprung into the work.

To dig out, to depart; to leave, esp. hastily; decamp. [Slang, U. S.]

Dig , n.

1. A thrust; a punch; a poke; as, a dig in the side or the ribs. See Dig, v. t., 4. [Colloq.]

2. A plodding and laborious student. [Cant, U.S.]

Dig , n.

1. A tool for digging. [Dial. Eng.]

2. An act of digging.

3. An amount to be dug.

4. (Mining) = Gouge.

-- Webster's unabridged 1913