ax

plural axes

1. USstandardUS standard spelling of axe.

   "Here I have sat many times, thinking,” he said. "The first cut should be angled correctly." He took off his hat and demonstrated a cut in the tree-calf. "Cut the next four," he said, and gave me the ax.

   2013, Per Martin Tvengsberg, Slash and burn shifting cultivation

   2 more examples

   The people of other nations, inhabitants of regions acquired not by conquest, but by compact, have been united with us in the participation of our rights and duties, of our burdens and blessings. The forest has fallen by the ax of our woodsmen; the soil has been made to teem by the tillage of our farmers; our commerce has whitened every ocean. The dominion of man over physical nature has been extended by the invention of our artists.

   1825 March 4, John Quincy Adams, John Quincy Adams's Inaugural Address

   "Run for the forest, Tamera!" he shouted, and leaped at me as a panther leaps, his bronze ax whirling like a flashing wheel about his head. And then sounded the clangor of strife and the hard-drawn panting of combat.

   1932, Robert E. Howard, People of the Dark

present singular third person axes · participle present axing · participle past axed · past axed

1. USstandardUS standard spelling of axe.

present singular third person axes · participle present axing · participle past axed · past axed

1. alternativedialectalnonstandardespecially African-American Vernacular; MLE and Bermuda; especially African-American Vernacular; MLE and BermudaAlternative form of ask.

   Ar try who'l ax em the hardest riddle, Ar soonest vind out oone put us, true...

   1879, William Barnes, “The Welshnut Tree”, in Complete Poems, volume 1, page 106

   5 more examples

   When they were come togedder, they axed off hym, sayinge: Master wilt thou at this tyme restore agayne the kyngdom of israhel?

   1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], →OCLC, Acts

   Dolly: And if so be, why did you ax me to keep you company? Housekeeper wants me below to pick raisins.

   1836, Joanna Baillie, The Alienated Manor, act 4

   "Thin the masther called out Dinny Moran, an' dhragged him up to one o' the Dublin young ladies, an' bid Dinny be stout an' ax her out to dance wid him."

   1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, London: H.G. Bohn, page 517

   Richard Dauntless: "But, axin' your pardon, miss, might I be permitted to salute the flag I'm a-goin' to sail under?"

   1887, Gilbert and Sullivan, Ruddigore, act 1

   ‘I axed him if he knowed the way and he said he had not fergitten the lay of the land.’

   1979, Verna Mae Slone, What My Heart Wants to Tell, page 18

1. A surname.