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definitions

wagon

[wag-uhn]
noun
  1. any of various kinds of four-wheeled vehicles designed to be pulled or having its own motor and ranging from a child's toy to a commercial vehicle for the transport of heavy loads, delivery, etc.
  2. Informal. station wagon.
  3. a police van for transporting prisoners; patrol wagon: The fight broke up before the wagon arrived.
  4. (initial capital letter) Astronomy. Charles's Wain.
  5. British. a railway freight car or flatcar.
  6. a baby carriage.
  7. Archaic. a chariot.
verb (used with object)
  1. to transport or convey by wagon.
verb (used without object)
  1. to proceed or haul goods by wagon: It was strenuous to wagon up the hill.Also especially British, waggon.
Idioms
  1. circle the wagons. circle(def 23).
  2. fix someone's wagon, Slang. to get even with or punish someone: He'd better mind his own business or I'll really fix his wagon.
  3. hitch one's wagon to a star, to have a high ambition, ideal, or purpose: It is better to hitch one's wagon to a star than to wander aimlessly through life.
  4. off the/one's wagon, Slang.
    1. again drinking alcoholic beverages after a period of abstinence: His failure to show up at work is one more sign that he’s fallen off the wagon again.
    2. returning to an unhealthy or bad habit: I’m usually on a diet, but sometimes I go off my wagon.
  5. on the wagon, Slang. abstaining from a current or former bad habit, as smoking, overeating, excessive drinking of alcoholic beverages, or taking drugs: She's been on the wagon for a month, now, so please don't offer her a drink.Also on the water wagon; British, on the water cart.

Origin of wagon

1505–15; < Dutch wagen; cognate with Old English wægn wain
Related formswag·on·less, adjective

Synonyms for wagon

1. cart, van, wain, truck, dray, lorry.
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
British Dictionary definitions for hitch your wagon to a star

Wagon

Waggon

noun
  1. the Wagon another name for the Plough

wagon

waggon

noun
  1. any of various types of wheeled vehicles, ranging from carts to lorries, esp a vehicle with four wheels drawn by a horse, tractor, etc, and used for carrying crops, heavy loads, etc
  2. British a railway freight truck, esp an open one
  3. US and Canadian a child's four-wheeled cart
  4. US and Canadian a police van for transporting prisoners and those arrested
  5. mainly US and Canadian See station wagon
  6. an obsolete word for chariot
  7. off the wagon informal no longer abstaining from alcoholic drinks
  8. on the wagon informal abstaining from alcoholic drinks
verb
  1. (tr) to transport by wagon
Derived Formswagonless or waggonless, adjective

Word Origin for wagon

C16: from Dutch wagen wain
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for hitch your wagon to a star

wagon

n.

1520s, from Middle Dutch wagen, waghen, from Proto-Germanic *wagnaz (cf. Old English wægn, Modern English wain, Old Saxon and Old High German wagan, Old Norse vagn, Old Frisian wein, German Wagen), from PIE *woghnos, from *wegh- "to carry, to move" (cf. Sanskrit vahanam "vessel, ship," Greek okhos, Latin vehiculum, Old Church Slavonic vozu "carriage, chariot," Russian povozka, Lithuanian vazis "a small sledge," Old Irish fen, Welsh gwain "carriage, cart;" see weigh).

In Dutch and German, the general word for "a wheel vehicle;" English use is a result of contact through Flemish immigration, Dutch trade, or the Continental wars. It has largely displaced the native cognate, wain. Spelling preference varied randomly between -g- and -gg- from mid-18c., before American English settled on the etymological wagon, while waggon remained common in Great Britain. Wagon train is attested from 1810. Phrase on the wagon "abstaining from alcohol" is 1904, originally on the water cart.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
hitch your wagon to a star in Culture

Hitch your wagon to a star

Aim high; hope for great things. This advice appears in the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Idioms and Phrases with hitch your wagon to a star

wagon

see fix someone's wagon; hitch one's wagon; on the bandwagon; on the wagon.

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.