unearth

[uhn-urth]

verb (used with object)

1. to dig or get out of the earth; dig up.

2. to uncover or bring to light by search, inquiry, etc..

   The lawyer unearthed new evidence.

unearth

/ ʌnˈɜːθ /

verb

1. to dig up out of the earth

2. to reveal or discover, esp by exhaustive searching

Word History and Origins

Origin of unearth¹

First recorded in 1400–50, unearth is from the late Middle English word unerthen. See un- ², earth

Example Sentences

One of the more remarkable findings was the product of pure scholarship: Mr. Goddio remembered a fresco he’d seen unearthed in Herculaneum, the city buried along with Pompeii by the Vesuvian eruption of A.D.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

The blanks for his three-piece flatware set, Traynor tells me over the phone, are based on a set of Korean flatware he unearthed, piece-by-piece, serendipitously, from those terrifying thrift store cutlery bins.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

His story is one of determination, unearthed as a rebuttal to the many insistences that he doesn’t belong in the Marines.

Read more on Salon

The actually number he's unearthed is somewhere in the region of 15, with several of them, like the "sword dragon", turning out to be new species.

Read more on BBC

In excavations that began in 2003, he and his colleagues have unearthed more than 100,000 fossils representing about 100 different species—mostly marine, but also land animals washed out to sea.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• ascertain 
• bring to light 
• determine 
• discover 
• dredge up 
• excavate 
• exhibit 
• exhume 
• expose 
• find 
• find out 
• reveal 
• uncover