transitive. To insert or embed (a thing) beneath a surface, by scooping, hollowing, or cutting. Chiefly in passive. rare before 18th cent.

To excavate, carve out; to form by excavation or carving.

To make by excavation; to cut or hollow out (a hole, etc.). Obsolete.

To hollow out, excavate (a hole, channel, canal, road, etc.).

To form by making a hollow (in something); to excavate. Often with out.

transitive. To make, fashion, or form (a material thing), esp. by digging or cutting; to carve out, dig out, etc. Now rare.

To form or make (a hole, channel, etc.) by hollowing out.

transitive. To excavate, as a tunnel; to make (one's way) by boring or excavating. Also figurative.