upheave
Americanverb (used with object)
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to heave or lift up; raise up or aloft.
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to force or throw up violently or with much power, as an erupting volcano.
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to cause a major disturbance or disorder in.
The revolution upheaved the government, causing its leaders to flee the country.
verb (used without object)
verb
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to heave or rise upwards
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geology to thrust (land) upwards or (of land) to be thrust upwards
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(tr) to disturb violently; throw into disorder
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of upheave
First recorded in 1250–1300, upheave is from the Middle English word upheven. See up-, heave
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:
These evils are sot too firm on American soil, it will take a greater power than Miss Meechim’s tracts to upheave ’em.
From Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife by Marietta Holley
The whole ocean about the island seemed to upheave.
From Tom Swift and His Wireless Message: or, the castaways of Earthquake island by Victor [pseud.] Appleton
The frozen crust was seen to upheave: and, the next moment, the head of the fox, and afterwards his whole body, appeared above the surface.
From Popular Adventure Tales by Mayne Reid
In the realm of shades, on a throne of gold, By the side of her royal spouse, behold Fair Proserpine, With gloomy mien, While deep sighs upheave her bosom.
From Poems and Ballads of Heinrich Heine by Heinrich Heine
Brown rocks, left bare by the receding tide, upheave their slippery backs, heavily festooned with seaweed, and the broad level sands lie wet and glistening in the sun.
From Dorrien of Cranston by Bertram Mitford
“If I had known, I’d have had a heart attack,” he said also, a reference to a point when things went especially upheaved.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 1, 2022
The 2014 shooting of Michael Brown upheaved many things in the U.S., including the career of DeRay Mckesson, who quit his job as an educator to become a full-time activist.
From Slate ● Sep. 11, 2018
Her well-to-do lifestyle is upheaved by news of her husband leaving her for another woman.
From The Guardian ● Nov. 29, 2017
He traces the origin of petroleum to volcanic disturbances which in early geological times upheaved the water and land surface of the earth and killed immense quantities of fish.
From Time Magazine Archive
We seem to be living through the biologic revolution, so far anyway, without being upheaved or even much disturbed by it.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
But as other states have led the way in upheaving their systems, Washington has been slow to follow suit.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 23, 2022
The first time I came to Hammars, I was barely a year old and knew nothing about the great and upheaving love that had brought me there.
From The New Yorker ● Dec. 10, 2018
If this is true, the forward step Italy is about to take need not, please God! be made in blood and violent social upheaving.
From Records of Later Life by Fanny Kemble
And this sudden upheaving was at first without danger to the body politic.
From My Lords of Strogue, Vol. I (of III) A Chronicle of Ireland, from the Convention to the Union by Lewis Wingfield
The nervousness which resulted from hard work and a long struggle for existence had not only given him palsy, but had left him with an upheaving diaphragm.
From Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume I, Alabama Narratives by United States. Work Projects Administration
Vast showers of splinters of ice fell as if from the sky, and rained like arrows through the smoke, but if there were any great blocks uphove they did not touch the ship.
From The Frozen Pirate by W. Clark (William Clark) Russell
Then with the sobbing grief he strove, For he saw his name thereon; And the heart within his breast uphove As the pen’s tale now he won.
From Poems By the Way by William Morris
"An island uphove by an earthquake," said I. "Great thunder!" he cried.
From Stories by English Authors: the Sea by Various
It lay, a black mass, and whether it was a vast huddle of weeds, or a great whale killed by the earthquake, or solid land uphove by the volcanic rupture, was not conjecturable.
From Stories by English Authors: the Sea by Various
Then with the sobbing grief he strove, For he saw his name thereon; And the heart within his breast uphove As the pen's tale now he won.
From Poems By The Way & Love Is Enough by William Morris
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
