chisel
Americannoun
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chisels
plural
-
a wedgelike tool with a cutting edge at the end of the blade, often made of steel, used for cutting or shaping wood, stone, etc.
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Astronomy. Chisel, the constellation Caelum.
verb (used with object)
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chisels,
present (3rd person singular)
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chiseled,
past participle, past
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chiselled,
past participle, past (especially British)
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chiseling,
present participle
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chiselling
present participle (especially British)
-
to cut, shape, or fashion by or as if by carving with a chisel.
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to cheat or swindle (someone).
He chiseled me out of fifty dollars.
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to get (something) by cheating or trickery.
He chiseled fifty dollars out of me.
noun
verb
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to carve (wood, stone, metal, etc) or form (an engraving, statue, etc) with or as with a chisel
-
slang to cheat or obtain by cheating
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
chiselsimple
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chiselssimple
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have chiseledperfect
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have chiselledperfect
-
has chiseledperfect
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has chiselledperfect
-
am chiselingprogressive
-
am chisellingprogressive
-
are chiselingprogressive
-
are chisellingprogressive
-
is chiselingprogressive
-
is chisellingprogressive
-
have been chiselingperfect progressive
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have been chisellingperfect progressive
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has been chiselingperfect progressive
-
has been chisellingperfect progressive
Past
-
chiseledsimple
-
chiselledsimple
-
had chiseledperfect
-
had chiselledperfect
-
was chiselingprogressive
-
was chisellingprogressive
-
were chiselingprogressive
-
were chisellingprogressive
-
had been chiselingperfect progressive
-
had been chisellingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of chisel
First recorded in 1325–75; Middle English, from Anglo-French, variant of Old French cisel, from unattested Vulgar Latin cīsellus, diminutive of unattested cīsus, for Latin caesus, past participle of caedere “to cut,” with -ī- generalized from prefixed derivatives; cf. excide
Explanation
When you carve a statue from a block of marble, you use a tool called a chisel to cut out the shape. Chisel is the name of the tool and also the name of the action. A chisel has a flat, sharp end. To carve using a chisel, you hit the back of it with a hammer or another blunt instrument. Chisel can also mean "to cheat." If someone chisels you out of your allowance, they shaved it away from you bit by bit.
Vocabulary lists containing chisel
Words to Know Before You Defrost the Bird
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The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
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On a Pedestal: Marble-ous Words for Sculpture
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Failure is fatal only when the chisel is abandoned and despair prevails.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 7, 2026
“I had to put the table upside down and use a chisel and grinder to remove as much material as I could. It took us three tries to get the table right.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 8, 2026
“CMS is continuing to chisel away at higher spending associated with coding intensity,” says Tricia Neuman, executive director for the Program on Medicare Policy at KFF, a health policy nonprofit.
From Barron's ● Jan. 27, 2026
Finally, he was able to chisel out the embedded trunk handle to open it, clambering in and driving his Model Y Long Range S.U.V. five miles to the closet supercharging station.
From New York Times ● Jan. 17, 2024
He liked the sharp whistle of the plane as it slid over the board, and the ringing sound of the chisel on stone from the mason’s shed.
From "The Door in the Wall" by Marguerite de Angeli
"We used big chisels on the end of broom handles. A bit like gardening hoes. You use those to stab at it and shave stuff way," explained Roche.
From BBC ● Mar. 1, 2026
One promising option is tungsten carbide, an Earth-abundant material already widely used in industrial machinery, cutting tools, and chisels.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 24, 2026
But when he has more time, he prefers snorkeling in riverbeds where he chisels into bedrock.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 13, 2025
He saw others who wanted to take a piece of it, who’d come to the metaphorical mountain with chisels in hand.
From Slate ● Nov. 28, 2024
Jon’s work table is an arsenal, there are little saws lying around, little chisels.
From "Cat's Eye" by Margaret Atwood
“Invitation” begins with “Circus,” with Kelly made up as a clown who pines for a beautiful performer, danced by Claire Sombert, who is herself in love with a chiseled aerialist, played by Igor Youskevitch.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 7, 2026
Its details are sharply chiseled and fluted, in the Streamline Moderne mode, and they turn what would otherwise be raw construction into lyrical architecture.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 27, 2026
Or is it that the shade of his green skin makes them appear more chiseled under bright lights?
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 11, 2026
Larry’s the pragmatic choice, but Luke is the romantic one, down to his handsome, chiseled features right out of a supermarket paperback.
From Salon ● Nov. 27, 2025
“Some of these rocks have words chiseled into them. Spanish words.”
From "The Smartest Kid in the Universe" by Chris Grabenstein
What counts as good looking is narrowly defined: chiselled facial features and visible muscles are non-negotiables.
From BBC ● Apr. 24, 2026
India's 'Prince' may have chiselled, film star-like good looks, but he will be prepared to fight if the crown slips.
From BBC ● Jun. 16, 2025
The caption said crews "carefully chiselled" out the cornered kitty and that it was now "safe and sound".
From BBC ● Apr. 14, 2024
The Frankenstein patchwork of his face has echoes of Alasdair Gray's chiselled artwork and he uses the same gentle accent and singsong voice as Gray himself.
From BBC ● Jan. 13, 2024
The walls were made of rough-hewn stone blocks chiselled with Greek inscriptions - thousands and thousands of them, like graffiti.
From "Blood of Olympus" by Rick Riordan
"Evolution is chiseling a sculpture, not constructing a building," Gokcumen said.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 10, 2026
“Looksmaxxing” has men hammering their jawlines, chiseling their own bone structure like Michelangelo with a front-facing camera.
From Salon ● May 27, 2026
By reducing the cost of chiseling, Springut reasons, architects can once again embrace the decorative flourishes of carved stone.
From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2023
She notes that chiseling and sanding away at stone is also a much slower process than working with other media.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 30, 2022
He stops to brush around a dark spot with his finger, chiseling around its perimeter until a rock comes loose.
From "The Last Cuentista" by Donna Barba Higuera
The team experimented with different carving and chiselling techniques and discovered fire was also an effective way to carve out the inside of the boat.
From BBC ● May 25, 2024
However, he said a local architect had "spotted its significance and got permission to save the artwork, spending a day chiselling it off the wall".
From BBC ● Oct. 5, 2022
We entered frosty courts by a secret hatchway and waved wooden racquets in majestic arcs, a ceremony akin to polar explorers chiselling out ice caves.
From The New Yorker ● Jan. 18, 2016
In Defoe’s tale, Robinson Crusoe spends five months making a canoe for himself, felling a cedar-tree, paring away its branches and chiselling out its innards.
From Economist ● May 24, 2012
The granite rends, at last, along the line, quite evenly, requiring very little chiselling afterwards to give the block a smooth face.
From Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) by John Ruskin
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
