hog

[hawg, hog]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR hog ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a hoofed mammal of the family Suidae, order Artiodactyla, comprising boars and swine.

a domesticated swine weighing 120 pounds (54 kg) or more, raised for market.

a selfish, gluttonous, or filthy person.

Slang.

a large, heavy motorcycle.
an impressively large luxury automobile.

Also hogg, hogget. British.

a sheep about one year old that has not been shorn.
the wool shorn from such a sheep.
any of several other domestic animals, as a bullock, that are one year old.

Railroads Slang. a locomotive.

a machine for shredding wood.

Curling. a stone that stops before reaching the hog score.

verb (used with object), hogged, hog·ging.

to appropriate selfishly; take more than one's share of.

to arch (the back) upward like that of a hog.

roach³(def 3).

(in machine-shop practice) to cut deeply into (a metal bar or slab) to reduce it to a shape suitable for final machining.

to shred (a piece of wood).

verb (used without object), hogged, hog·ging.

Nautical. (of a hull) to have less than the proper amount of sheer because of structural weakness; arch.Compare sag(def 6a).

Idioms

go the whole hog, to proceed or indulge completely and unreservedly: We went the whole hog and took a cruise around the world.Also go whole hog.

live high off/on the hog, to be in prosperous circumstances.Also eat high off the hog.

Origin of hog

1300–50; Middle English; compare Old English hogg- in place-names; perhaps < Celtic; compare Welsh hwch, Cornish hogh swine

Related formshog·like, adjectiveun·hogged, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for hogging

monopolize

Examples from the Web for hogging

Contemporary Examples of hogging

Because they knew even as they succeeded in hogging the spotlight people were snickering at them.
Of Gamers, Gates, and Disco Demolition: The Roots of Reactionary Rage
Arthur Chu
October 16, 2014
Now a particularly ugly strand of this phenomenon, Native American appropriation, is hogging the spotlight.
Pharrell, Harry Styles, and Native American Appropriation
Amy Zimmerman
June 4, 2014
Not that David Macklovitch (aka Dave 1, aka the tall, skinny, Jewish one) is hogging credit for this.
Chromeo’s Dave 1 on ‘White Women’ and Bringing Back the Funk
Melissa Leon
May 12, 2014
Once denounced by McCain as ‘wacko birds’ hogging the spotlight, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul are soaring.
Ted Cruz Might Just Have Won the Future for the GOP
Nick Gillespie
September 25, 2013
He jiggled the faceted glass door knob to let the person inside know he was hogging the lavatory.
Exclusive Excerpt: MLK's Haunting Final Hours
Hampton Sides
April 24, 2010

Historical Examples of hogging

"Now, here we have a battery of six hogging machines," he'd say.
The House of Torchy
Sewell Ford
This is known as the "hogging down" method of harvesting corn.
North Dakota
Various
So there was me, white in the face with grandeur, hogging the engine into the shed.
Plain Mary Smith
Henry Wallace Phillips
We sit back and roast the trusts to a fare-you-well for hogging all there is in sight.
A Daughter of the Dons
William MacLeod Raine
"I think the way you two fellows are hogging the Ys and captaincies around here is disgraceful," complained the Codfish one night.
Frank Armstrong at College
Matthew M. Colton

British Dictionary definitions for hogging

hog

noun

a domesticated pig, esp a castrated male weighing more than 102 kg

US and Canadian any artiodactyl mammal of the family Suidae; pig

Also: hogg British dialect, Australian and NZ another name for hogget

informal a selfish, greedy, or slovenly person

nautical a stiff brush, for scraping a vessel's bottom

nautical the amount or extent to which a vessel is hoggedCompare sag (def. 6)

another word for camber (def. 4)

slang, mainly US a large powerful motorcycle

go the whole hog informal to do something thoroughly or unreservedlyif you are redecorating one room, why not go the whole hog and paint the entire house?

live high on the hog or live high off the hog informal, mainly US to have an extravagant lifestyle

verb hogs, hogging or hogged (tr)

slang to take more than one's share of

to arch (the back) like a hog

to cut (the mane) of (a horse) very short

Derived Formshogger, nounhoglike, adjective

Word Origin for hog

Old English hogg, from Celtic; compare Cornish hoch

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 hogging

hog

late 12c. (implied in hogaster), "swine reared for slaughter" (usually about a year old), also used by stockmen for "young sheep" (mid-14c.) and for "horse older than one year," suggesting the original sense had something to do with an age, not a type of animal. Not evidenced in Old English, but it may have existed. Possibility of British Celtic origin {Watkins, etc.] is regarded by OED as "improbable." Figurative sense of "gluttonous person" is first recorded early 15c. Meaning "Harley-Davidson motorcycle" is attested from 1967.

To go hog wild is from 1904. Hog in armor "awkward or clumsy person in ill-fitting attire" is from 1650s. Phrase to go the whole hog (1828) is sometimes said to be from the butcher shop option of buying the whole slaughtered animal (at a discount) rather than just the choice bits. But it is perhaps rather from the story (recorded in English from 1779) of Muslim sophists, forbidden by the Quran from eating a certain unnamed part of the hog, who debated which part was intended and managed to exempt the whole of it from the prohibition.

hog

"to appropriate greedily," U.S. slang, 1884 (first attested in "Huck Finn"), from hog (n.). Related: Hogged; hogging.

Idioms and Phrases with hogging

hog

see go hog wild; go whole hog; high off the hog; road hog.