auger

• augre

From a rebracketing of Middle English a nauger (seen as an + auger), from Old English nafugār (“nave drill”, literally “nave spear”), from Proto-West Germanic *nabugaiʀ, from Proto-Germanic *nabōgaizaz. Cognate with Dutch avegaar.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɔː.ɡə(ɹ)/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːɡə(ɹ)
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɔ.ɡɚ/
• (cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ˈɑ.ɡɚ/

  • Audio (US cot-caught merger)

    (file)

• Audio (AU)

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• Homophone: augur

auger (plural augers)

1. A carpenter's tool for boring holes longer than those bored by a gimlet.
   • 1996, Janette Turner Hospital, Oyster, paperback edition, Virago Press, page 231:

     Pete Burnett needs a fan belt for his auger.

2. A snake or plumber's snake (plumbing tool).
3. A tool used to bore holes in the ground, e.g. for fence posts
4. A hollow drill used to take core samples of soil, ice, etc. for scientific study.

auger (third-person singular simple present augers, present participle augering, simple past and past participle augered)

1. To use an auger; to drill a hole using an auger.
2. To proceed in the manner of an auger.
   • 2010, Clive Cussler, Jack Du Brul, The Silent Sea‎:

     It augered into the water and vanishedunder the surface only to float up again, its keel pointing skyward.

   • 2012, Ronald Wright, A Scientific Romance‎:

     There was no way to measure progress inside the sphere, to know whether it spun or leapt or wobbled like a top as it augered through the years.

   • 2014, Steven R. Boyett, Mortality Bridge‎:

     It augers down again behind him to gyre like a mindless deadly battling top.

• gimlet

• auger in

Not to be confused with augur.

• Argue, Gauer, Graue, argue, augre, rugae

From auge.

• IPA^(key): /o.ʒe/

• Audio

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auger

1. to dig in order to get the shape of a trough
2. to bend a piece of flat iron into the shape of a gutter, of an eavestrough

This is a regular -er verb, but the stem is written auge- before endings that begin with -a- or -o- (to indicate that the -g- is a "soft" /ʒ/ and not a "hard" /ɡ/). This spelling-change occurs in all verbs in -ger, such as neiger and manger.

• argue, argué
• urgea

auger

1. (nonstandard form) indefinite plural of auga
2. (nonstandard form) indefinite plural of auge