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
- upheaver noun
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.
“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
But as other states have led the way in upheaving their systems, Washington has been slow to follow suit.
From Seattle Times
A little later, he sees that the disk had disappeared and “in its place was a billow of blood, for so it looked, a vast upheaved billow of glowing blood surging on the horizon.”
From Washington Post
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
The Ice was not so upheaved and tormented as in the Fire-Hills region, but it was rotten.
From Literature
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.