Crossword clues for pickaxe
pickaxe
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Pickax \Pick"ax`\, Pickaxe \Pick"axe`\ (p[i^]k"[a^]ks`), n. [A
corruption of OE. pikois, pikeis, F. picois, fr. pic. See
Pick, n.]
A pick with a point at one end, a transverse edge or blade at
the other, and a handle inserted at the middle; a hammer with
a flattened end for driving wedges and a pointed end for
piercing as it strikes.
--Shak.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
n. A heavy iron tool with a wooden handle; one end of the head is pointed, the other has a chisel edge. vb. To use a pickaxe.
WordNet
Wikipedia
A pickaxe or pick is a hand tool with a hard head attached perpendicular to the handle.
Some people make the distinction that a pickaxe has a head with a pointed end and a blunt end, and a pick has both ends pointed, or only one end; but the international Oxford Dictionary of English states that both words mean the same, i.e. a tool with a long handle at right angles to a curved iron or steel bar with a point at one end and a chisel or point at the other, used for breaking up hard ground or rock.
The head is usually made of metal, and the handle is most commonly wood, metal or fiberglass. The head is a spike ending in a sharp point, may curve slightly, and often has a counter-weight to improve ease of use. The stronger the spike, the more effectively the tool can pierce the surface. Rocking the embedded spike about and removing it can then break up the surface.
The counterweight nowadays is nearly always a second spike, often with a flat end for prying.
The pointed edge is most often used to break up rocky surfaces or other hard surfaces such as concrete or hardened dried earth. The large momentum of a heavy pickaxe on a small contact area makes it very effective for this purpose. The chiseled end, if present, is used for purposes including cutting through roots.
Originally used as agricultural tools as far back as prehistoric cultures, picks have also served for tasks ranging from traditional mining to warfare. The design has also evolved into other tools such as the plough and the mattock. In prehistoric times a large shed deer antler from a suitable species (e.g. red deer) was often cut down to its shaft and its lowest tine and used as a one-pointed pick, and with it sometimes a large animal's shoulder blade as a crude shovel. During war in medieval times, the pickaxe was used as a weapon.
Unicode 5.2 in the Miscellaneous Symbols block introduces the glyph ⛏ (U+26CF PICK), representable in HTML as ⛏ or ⛏, to represent this tool.
Usage examples of "pickaxe".
Hence, if we are mining it further away, we will be collecting the bauxite with pickaxe and shovel, carrying it out of the mine by wheelbarrow, hoist, or mine car, and shipping it to the processing plant by pack mule, wagon, barge or ship.
This would have taken too long with the pickaxe alone, and it is known that Harding was an ingenious man.
If Ronne had plenty of sewing, Nodtvedt had no less forging -- sledge-fittings, knives, pickaxes, bars and bolts, patent hooks by the hundred for dogs, chains, and so on to infinity.
Monsieur Souche, who had left a pickaxe and several heaps of rubbish and other signs of an intention to come back.
In the end I swallowed two Temazepam and spent the night in a daze, seeing a squadron of policemen and joiners break down the walls with pickaxes before marching rhythmically round and round my bedroom.
As he hung there, Masin had held up the handle of a pickaxe as high as he could reach against the smooth wall, as a crossbar on which Malipieri had succeeded in getting a slight foothold, enough for a man who was not heavy and was extraordinarily active.
Klyucharyov returns to the overground armed with the things he needs: a pickaxe, a crowbar, a shovel, some candles.
This feeling was so strong that at the moment when Edmond was about to begin his labor, he stopped, laid down his pickaxe, seized his gun, mounted to the summit of the highest rock, and from thence gazed round in every direction.
Where other dwarves charged with pickaxes, battle-axes, warhammers, and swords held high, Gutbusters just charged.
About ten men mounted the sides of the Nautilus, armed with pickaxes to break the ice around the vessel, which was soon free.
Frank, seeing what had happened, screamed like a beserker and ran at the beast with the pickaxe raised above his head.
Fosbery met his death like a gallant gentleman, but not more heroically than Barry, the humble private, who, surrounded by Boers, thought neither of himself nor of them, but smashed at the maxim gun with a pickaxe until he fell riddled with bullets.
He was one of those engineers who began by handling the hammer and pickaxe, like generals who first act as common soldiers.
Sharpe could hear the sound of pickaxes making yet more loopholes in the thick walls of the barns and house.
Then Dantes rose more agile and light than the kid among the myrtles and shrubs of these wild rocks, took his gun in one hand, his pickaxe in the other, and hastened towards the rock on which the marks he had noted terminated.