rough-hew
rough-hew verb: to cut or shape something roughly without finishing or tidying the surface.
Verb
rough-hew (third-person singular simple present rough-hews, present participle rough-hewing, simple past rough-hewed, past participle rough-hewn)
- To cut or shape something roughly without finishing or tidying the surface.
- Our indiscretion sometimes serues vs well, / When our deare plots do paule, and that should teach vs, / There's a Diuinity that shapes our ends, / Rough-hew them how we will.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
- It seems to me, then, that one must either be a ‘marinist’ […], or be a sub-äerialist, and believe that in Pre-Permian times the sea rough-hewed a block of country which the atmosphere has ever since been carving into its now complex and beautiful form.1870, J. Clifton Ward, Geological Magazine, VII.67
Forms of rough-hew
| third-person singular present | rough-hews |
|---|---|
| present participle | rough-hewing |
| past | rough-hewed |
| past participle | rough-hewn |
Origin of rough-hew
From rough + hew.
Questions about rough-hew
- What does rough-hew mean?
- Rough-hew means to cut or shape something roughly without finishing or tidying the surface.
- What part of speech is rough-hew?
- Rough-hew is a verb.
- What is the past tense of rough-hew?
- The past tense of rough-hew is rough-hewed.
Words near rough-hew in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: rough-hew (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “rough-hew.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/rough-hew. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.