plough

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English plough, also plouh and plow,^[2][3] inherited from Old English plōh, also plōg, which in Old English seems to have meant mainly a measure of land, as much as a team of oxen could plough.^[4][5][6][3] Many dictionaries take the late Old English word as borrowed from Old Norse plógr (“plough”),^{[7][8][9][10][2]} while Etymonline and Barnhart give a Scandinavian source only as a possibility.^[6][3] It goes back to Proto-Germanic *plōgaz,^[6][9][11] and is cognate with Old Frisian plōch, Old Saxon plōg, Middle Low German plōch, Middle Dutch ploech, Dutch ploeg, Old High German pfluog and German Pflug.^[6][3][11] The Germanic word is late and of uncertain origin:^[6][3][12] Gothic used 𐌷𐍉𐌷𐌰 (hōha) for the implement,^[3] and the usual Old English word was sulh, cognate with Latin sulcus (“furrow”).^[6][9][7] Pliny recorded plovus (“plough”) as a Rhaetian word;^[6][10] Klein traces the Germanic words to it,^[10] Etymonline takes the Latin word, like Lithuanian plūgas, as probably a borrowing from Germanic,^[6] and Ayto derives the Germanic base from an ancient Indo-European language of northern Italy, the source also of plaustrum (“wagon”).^[9][7] Boutkan, quoted by Etymonline, notes that an initial p- in a Germanic word points to a non-Indo-European origin.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A measure of land, a ploughland: late Old English, before 1100.^[3][4][6] The implement itself is recorded probably about 1150, as plowe,^[3] while the 1989 edition of the OED first records it about 1200.^[13]

Semantic evolution

In Old English the word for the implement was usually sulh, and plōh was rare on its own;^[6][9] the Middle English Dictionary notes that as an element in names plough is most frequent in the area of the Danelaw.^[2][6] The land sense lived on as ploughland, a unit of land assessment,^[8][7] and the word could also mean the team of oxen or horses drawing a plough, chiefly in Scotland.^[7] The earliest record of the Plough for the seven stars of Ursa Major comes from early 16th-century Scotland;^[9] Weekley compares Latin names of the Great and Little Bear that meant plough oxen.^[14] The verb, formed from the noun, is recorded in 1374.^[3][6] From the 1580s it was used of anything that cuts through a surface like a plough, from 1607 of a ship cleaving the water.^[6][13][7] Figurative uses followed: to go through something laboriously (1891) and to plough back profits into a business (1930).^[3] A candidate who failed an examination could be said to be ploughed, and the noun for such a failure is recorded from 1863, in Reade's Very Hard Cash.^[15] Slang also used the noun for the penis and the verb for sexual intercourse from the 16th century.^[16] The ploughman's lunch of bread and cheese is recorded only from the 1950s.^[17]

Timeline

• before 1100 – plōh, a measure of land, ploughland.^[3][4]
• c. 1150 – the implement, as plowe.^[3] The 1989 edition of the OED first records it about 1200.^[13]
• before 1325 – the spelling plough.^[3]
• 1374 – verb, to make furrows with a plough.^[3] The OED's first quotation is from about 1420–40.^[13]
• early 16th century – the Plough, the seven bright stars of Ursa Major, in Scotland.^[9]
• 1553 – slang, verb, to have sexual intercourse.^[16]
• 1588 – to furrow or tear up a surface as a plough does.^[13] Etymonline dates the sense "to traverse like a plough" to the 1580s.^[6]
• 1607 – of a ship, to cleave the surface of the water.^[13][7]
• 1863 – noun, the failing of a candidate in an examination.^[15]
• 1891 – to proceed laboriously, plod.^[3]
• 1930 – plough back, to reinvest profits in a business.^[3]
• 1950s – ploughman's lunch.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. A farm implement with one or more blades, drawn by a tractor or by animals, that cuts furrows in the soil and turns it over before sowing.^[18][7][19]
2. A similar device for other work, such as clearing snow.^[18]
3. A plane with a narrow blade for cutting grooves in wood.^[18]
4. (chiefly British) Ploughed land: The hare raced across the plough.^[18][19][7]
5. the Plough: the group of the seven brightest stars in Ursa Major, called the Big Dipper in the United States.^[18][9]
6. put one's hand to the plough: to begin or take on a task.^[18][7]
7. (archaic) A ploughland, a measure of land.^[19][7]

Verb

1. To break up and turn over soil with a plough: They ploughed the lower field in spring.^[18][7][19]
2. To make furrows or grooves in something, with or as if with a plough.^[18][7]
3. Of a ship, to cut a way through the water.^[7][13]
4. To go on through something laboriously; to plod.^[3]
5. plough back: to reinvest profits in the business that earned them.^[3]

Word family

• ploughman
• ploughshare
• ploughland
• ploughboy
• snowplough

Usage notes

Plough is the British spelling and plow the usual American one for both the noun and the verb.^[18][17][3] In England plough has been the accepted spelling since about 1700;^[6][3] before the 18th century the noun was usually spelled plough and the verb plow.^[17][20] The final guttural sound of the spelling began to disappear in the 14th century but lasted longer in the north and in Scotland,^[6] and in the north of England it became an f sound, as in cough;^[3] the English Dialect Dictionary records many such forms, from Scotland, Ireland and England.^[21]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
5. ^ Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d e f g h Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
10. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
11. ^ a b Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
12. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
13. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
15. ^ a b Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
16. ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
17. ^ a b c d Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
18. ^ a b c d e f g h i Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
19. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
20. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
21. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)