chaw

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to chew without swallowing

   Chaw tobacco.

2. 2
   noun

   Chewing tobacco.

   When the doctor told him to quit smoking, Harvey switched to chaw, but then developed cancer of the mouth.

3. 3
   verb

   To chew; grind with one's teeth; to masticate (food, or the cud).

   The trampling steede, with gold and purple trapt,.

4. 4
   verb

   To ruminate (about) in thought; to ponder; to consider.

   "I home retourning, fraught with fowle despight, And chawing vengeaunce all the way I went, Soone as my loathed love appeard in sight, With wrathfull hand I slew her innocent;.

From Early Modern English chawe, either a form of Middle English chaul, chavel, jawle, jawe (“jaw”) (whence also English jowl) which has lost the final -l, or from Middle English *chawe, *chowe, from Old English *ċēawe, *ċēowe (“jaw”), or a form of Middle English jowe, jawe (“jaw”). See jowl and jaw for more.

Topics

External links

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