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axe

Pronunciation: /æks/

The English word “axe” has 10 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A tool for felling trees or chopping wood etc. consisting of a heavy head flattened to a blade on one side, and a handle attached to it.
  2. An ancient weapon consisting of a head that has one or two blades and a long handle.
  3. A dismissal or rejection.
  4. A drastic reduction or cutback.
  5. A gigging musician's particular instrument, especially a guitar in rock music or a saxophone in jazz.
  6. A position, interest, or reason in buying and selling stock, often with ulterior motives.
  7. The axle of a wheel.

verb

  1. To fell or chop with an axe.
  2. To lay off, terminate or drastically reduce, especially in a rough or ruthless manner; to cancel.
  3. To furnish with an axle.

Etymology

From Middle English ax, axe, ex, from Old English æx (“axe”), from Proto-West Germanic *akusi (“axe”), from Proto-Germanic *akwisī (“axe”), probably from a Proto-Indo-European *h₂egʷsih₂ (“axe”), from *h₂eḱ- (“sharp, pointed”). Cognate with Scots aix (“axe”), Dutch aks (“axe”), German Axt (“axe”), Danish økse (“axe”), Faroese, Norwegian Bokmål, and Norwegian Nynorsk øks (“axe”), Icelandic öxi…

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.