hug

plural hugs

1. A close embrace, especially when charged with an emotion such as affection, joy, relief, lust, anger, aggression, compassion, or the like, as opposed to being characterized by formality, equivocation or ambivalence (a half-embrace).
2. A particular grip in wrestling.

present singular third person hugs · participle present hugging · participle past hugged · past hugged

1. intransitiveobsoleteTo crouch; to huddle as with cold.

   They had a slight breast work, and they hugged down behind it and waited.

   1885, M. Quad, Field, Fort and Fleet, page 354

   4 more examples

   That is why they are so little known and never explored. During the day, when a Chilean cruiser nosed around uncomfortably close, the little sloop would be hugged under the lee of one of the islands, sail lowered and anchor dropped.

   1892, Paul Boyton, The Story of Paul Boyton

   bright rocks whose stain of emerald or quartz shaft of shine the starfish hugged beneath the tide .

   1892, The Sewanee Review - Volume 66, page 263

   She put her feet on a rung and hugged down against her knees, making herself even smaller.

   2014, Thomas Gifford, The Cavanaugh Quest

   Zhai Tingshen stood at the window upstairs, his black eyes staring intently at the figure that was tightly hugged below.

   2020, Zhenyinfang, Marital Passion

   Synonyms: hunker, squat, stoop

2. intransitiveTo cling closely together.

   Synonyms: cleave

3. reciprocaltransitiveTo embrace by holding closely, especially in the arms.

   Billy hugged Danny until he felt better.

   1 more example

   They hugged for what seemed like an eternity.

   Synonyms: accoll

4. transitiveTo stay close to.

   to hug the shore, to hug the coastline

   2 more examples

   We toted in the wood and got the fire going nice and comfortable. Lord James still set in one of the chairs and Applegate had cabbaged the other and was hugging the stove.

   1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VIII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC

   Gourock also boasted a pier railway, although its pier hugged the shore rather than jutting into the bay.

   2020 October 21, Dr Joseph Brennan, “From the main line and over the waves”, in Rail, page 60

5. figurativelytransitiveTo hold fast; to cling to; to cherish.

   We hug intellectual deformities, if they bear our names

   1665, Joseph Glanvill, Scepsis Scientifica: Or, Confest Ignorance, the Way to Science; […], London: […] E. C[otes] for Henry Eversden […], →OCLC

   Synonyms: treasure