paw

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   touch clumsily

   The store clerk tried to paw me.

2. 2
   verb

   scrape with the paws

   The bear pawed the door

3. 3
   noun

   A hand.

   Get your grubby paws off my things!

4. 4
   verb

   To touch (someone) in a sexual way.

   IronMan used to be good in this way, back in the '80s. […] They wouldn't subscribe to the old, "Let's put a male bodybuilder with silicone babes pawing him" cover that's mainstay now.

5. 5
   noun

   a clawed foot of an animal especially a quadruped

6. 6
   noun

   the (prehensile) extremity of the superior limb

7. 7
   noun

   The soft foot of a mammal or other animal, generally a quadruped, that has claws or nails; comparable to a human hand or foot.

8. 8
   verb

   Of an animal, to touch (something) with a paw.

Etymology

From Middle English pawe, from Old French poue, poe, from Vulgar Latin *pauta. Further origin unknown, perhaps from Frankish *pōta, from Frankish *pōtōn (“to put, stick, plant”), from Proto-Germanic *putōną, whence also Old English potian (“to push”), pȳtan (“to put out, poke out”). See more at put. Doublet of pote, put, and putt. Cognate with Dutch poot, poten (“to plant”), Low German Pote, German Pfote, Icelandic pota (“to stick”).