sow
1 Americanverb (used with object)
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sows,
present (3rd person singular)
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sowed,
past participle, past
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sown,
past participle
-
sowing
present participle
-
to scatter (seed) over land, earth, etc., for growth; plant.
-
to plant seed for.
to sow a crop.
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to scatter seed over (land, earth, etc.) for the purpose of growth.
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to implant, introduce, or promulgate; seek to propagate or extend; disseminate.
to sow distrust or dissension.
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to strew or sprinkle with anything.
verb (used without object)
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sows,
present (3rd person singular)
-
sowed,
past participle, past
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sown,
past participle
-
sowing
present participle
noun
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sows
plural
-
an adult female swine.
-
the adult female of various other animals, as the bear.
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Metallurgy.
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a large oblong mass of iron that has solidified in the common channel through which the molten metal flows to the smaller channels in which the pigs solidify.
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the common channel itself.
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a basin holding any of certain molten nonferrous metals to be cast.
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noun
-
a female adult pig
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the female of certain other animals, such as the mink
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metallurgy
-
the channels for leading molten metal to the moulds in casting pig iron
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iron that has solidified in these channels
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verb
-
to scatter or place (seed, a crop, etc) in or on (a piece of ground, field, etc) so that it may grow
to sow wheat
to sow a strip of land
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(tr) to implant or introduce
to sow a doubt in someone's mind
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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sowsimple
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sowssimple
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have sowedperfect
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have sownperfect
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has sowedperfect
-
has sownperfect
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am sowingprogressive
-
are sowingprogressive
-
is sowingprogressive
-
have been sowingperfect progressive
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has been sowingperfect progressive
Past
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sowedsimple
-
had sowedperfect
-
had sownperfect
-
was sowingprogressive
-
were sowingprogressive
-
had been sowingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of sow1
First recorded before 900; Middle English sowen, Old English sāwan; cognate with Dutch zaaien, German säen, Old Norse sā, Gothic saian; akin to seed, Latin sēmen “seed”
Origin of sow2
First recorded before 900; Middle English soue, sou(we), Old English sugu, sū; cognate with German Sau, Old Norse sȳr, Latin sūs, Greek hûs, Tocharian B suwo; see swine
Explanation
When you plant seeds in the ground, you sow them. You can also sow things like doubts or ideas, simply by spreading them around. If your ideas (or your seeds) develop and grow, you've successfully sown them. The verb sow is pronounced completely differently from the noun sow, which means "a female pig." When you sow flower seeds, it rhymes with "go." When you admire an enormous, muddy sow in a pig pen, it rhymes with "cow." When two words are spelled the same but sound different, they're called heteronyms.
Vocabulary lists containing sow
"The Hill We Climb," by Amanda Gorman
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Dirty Words: The Language of Gardening
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Starting Your New Life: Inspiring Words from Commencement Speeches
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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:
“Keeping kids safe requires rigorous independent evaluations like ours, and we hope OpenAI will engage on the substance of what we found, rather than trying to sow doubt on our methodology.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 7, 2026
Defence lawyers attempted to sow doubt about the prosecution's evidence.
From BBC ● Sep. 2, 2026
On Friday morning, Burke’s defense team tried to sow doubt about the conclusiveness of the autopsy conducted in the case.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 24, 2026
The defence for Robinson, who has not yet entered a plea, sought to sow doubt on all of it.
From BBC ● Jul. 11, 2026
The sow had a sweeter temper than some horses he had ridden.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
Wall Street loves an ugly portmanteau, or jamming together of two words in a way that sows confusion, followed closely by dislike.
From Barron's ● Jun. 12, 2026
When feed costs become unsustainable, farmers may be forced to kill or sell off the breeding cows and sows that represent the future of the food supply.
From Salon ● Apr. 8, 2026
“He who sows the wind shall reap the whirlwind,” he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 1, 2026
He sows chaos even when he clearly doesn’t mean the things he says.
From Slate ● Mar. 6, 2026
She didn’t like it a bit when I started out to catch and mark all the pigs that our sows had raised that year.
From "Old Yeller" by Fred Gipson
Yet the deal angered many Venezuelans and sowed confusion among some oil executives, and even U.S. officials, over what was agreed and how the arrangement would work.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 30, 2026
But it sowed a seed and she joined a local running club in Manchester.
From BBC ● Apr. 27, 2026
The American Academy of Pediatrics called the order "historic and welcome," saying in a statement the changes had "sowed chaos and confusion for parents and pediatricians across the country."
From Barron's ● Mar. 16, 2026
The 2023 leadership shake-up in China’s Rocket Force, followed by the removal of other high-level leaders, sowed confusion and instability in the overall space program.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 8, 2026
People in Paleolithic societies had led the unsettled life of the hunter and food gatherer, reaping where nature sowed and thus at the mercy of forces that they could neither understand nor control.
From "History of Art, Volume 1" by H.W. Janson
The seeds were sown by Australian miners in the 1930s, who introduced the game, one with deep roots in New South Wales and Queensland, to the local population.
From BBC ● Oct. 15, 2026
Sam Sacks finds that Ray Nayler’s novel is “skillfully sown with dramatic surprises” even as it straddles the divide “between the speculative and the plausible.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026
But in about 1989, the seeds of a new Muffler Man era were sown.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 12, 2026
In the meantime, the legal seesawing has sown uncertainty over the pill that the US Food and Drug Administration approved more than a quarter-century ago.
From Barron's ● May 10, 2026
As if she knew of her impending fate, Ma gave Kim the backpack with her jewelry sown in the straps, as well as her favorite shirt, on his last visit to her.
From "First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers" by Loung Ung
In the northern hemisphere, October has long been a time for reaping—but also for sowing.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 29, 2026
Major job-search platforms say they are focused on what’s phony and sowing mistrust.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 5, 2026
It’s a grim idea, that our hope is in a tool that discourages in-depth reading and a long-shot hypothetical strategy—both of which rely on technology known for sowing confusion.
From Slate ● Aug. 26, 2026
"In the spring when it was crazy rain, everything was delayed - sowing and planting -because it was just relentless, and then it was almost like an off-switch," added garden and food writer Stephanie Hafferty.
From BBC ● Jul. 22, 2026
Men, women, and children were in the fields at their lawful labor, plowing, weeding, sowing, where they would remain till dusk.
From "Crispin: The Cross of Lead" by Avi
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