digging stick

American  

noun

1. a pointed or spatulate wooden stick, sometimes having a stone weight or crossbar attached and used in primitive societies for loosening the ground to extract buried wild plant foods and for tilling the soil.

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Etymology

Origin of digging stick

First recorded in 1860–65

Example Sentences

The shape suggests that it may have been part of a digging stick; however, the specimen is very highly polished on all of its preserved surfaces.

From A Burial Cave in Baja California The Palmer Collection, 1887 by Massey, William C.

With one was found a mug, a ladle, a digging stick, and two ring baskets that had held food.

From Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado by United States. Dept. of the Interior

Burr took her digging stick from beside her door and hacked a point on it with her new ax.

From The Cave Boy of the Age of Stone by McIntyre, Margaret A.

She stood with her legs wide apart, waving her wanna, or long digging stick in the air, and rocking her body to and fro, whilst her kangaroo-skin cloak floated behind her in the wind.

From Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 2 by Grey, George

Her only other implement is her digging stick, the primitive pick-plow excavator.

From Oriental Women by Pollard, Edward Bagby