pickaxe
/ˈpɪkaks
/(US also pickax)
noun
another term for pick2 (sense 1).He believes that a 17-year-old youth was paid to smash the windows of three of his vehicles with pickaxes and hammers....
- Cranes and bulldozers were brought in to clear the streets while 18 teams of rescue workers dug with pickaxes and shovels.
- Then our youngest officer managed to stretch out his arm and use a pickaxe to move the stone the dog was lodged behind.
verb [with object]
Break or strike with a pickaxe.Exposed to the boiling sun of the tropic region, he pickaxed and carried earth on a pole for 7 years, not having proper rests....
- He pickaxed a deep hole right in front of the statue. Then he buried the stone.
- In the midst of digging a ditch for a new fence line one summer, he pickaxed into a massive tangle of hibernating snakes.
Origin
Middle English pikoys, from Old French picois; related to pike2. The change in the ending was due to association with axe.