trenching

Verb

trench (third-person singular simple present trenches, present participle trenching, simple past and past participle trenched)

1. (usually) To invade, especially with regard to the rights or the exclusive authority of another; to encroach.
   • Shee is the Judge, Thou Executioner, Or if thou needs would'st trench upon her power, Thou mightst have yet enjoy'd thy crueltie, With some more thrift, and more varietie.1640, Ben Jonson, Underwoods, page 68
2. (infantry) To excavate an elongated pit for protection of soldiers and or equipment, usually perpendicular to the line of sight toward the enemy.
   • No more shall trenching war channel her fields.c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
3. To excavate an elongated and often narrow pit.
4. To have direction; to aim or tend.
   • the reason and consequence thereof may trench to point of estate1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Judicature”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC
5. To cut; to form or shape by cutting; to make by incision, hewing, etc.
   • The wide wound that the boar had trenched / In his soft flank.1593, [William Shakespeare], Venus and Adonis, London: […] Richard Field, […], →OCLC
6. To cut furrows or ditches in.
   • to trench land for the purpose of draining it

See all 13 meanings of trench