Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An object, such as a cork or a wad of cloth, used to fill a hole tightly; a stopper.
  • noun A dense mass of material that obstructs a passage.
  • noun A usually cylindrical or conic piece cut from something larger, often as a sample.
  • noun A fitting, commonly with two metal prongs for insertion in a fixed socket, used to connect an appliance to a power supply.
  • noun A spark plug.
  • noun A hydrant.
  • noun A flat cake of pressed or twisted tobacco.
  • noun A piece of chewing tobacco.
  • noun Geology A mass of igneous rock filling the vent of a volcano.
  • noun Informal A favorable public mention of a commercial product, business, or performance, especially when broadcast.
  • noun Slang Something inferior, useless, or defective, especially an old, worn-out horse.
  • noun Slang A gunshot or bullet.
  • noun A fishing lure having a hook or hooks.
  • intransitive verb To fill (a hole) tightly with or as if with a plug; stop up.
  • intransitive verb To insert (something) as a plug.
  • intransitive verb To insert in an appropriate place or position.
  • intransitive verb To hit with a bullet; shoot.
  • intransitive verb To hit with the fist; punch.
  • intransitive verb Informal To publicize (a product, for example) favorably, as by mentioning on a broadcast.
  • intransitive verb To become stopped up or obstructed.
  • intransitive verb Informal To move or work doggedly and persistently.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In geology, a cylindrical mass of lava, a remnant of the last eruption from a volcanic vent, which chilled in the conduit and plugged it up. See neck, 6 , and stock, 35.
  • noun A book that does not sell at all.
  • noun In stone-cutting, a wedge which is driven into a hole that has been drilled in a stone for the purpose of splitting it. For large pieces of stone a series of holes is drilled and a wedge or plug driven into each.
  • noun In a steam-engine: A plug-rod; a plug-frame.
  • noun A safety-plug; a fusible plug inserted in a boiler and made of some alloy which will melt if the temperature of the metal plate of the shell rises above a certain point by reason of low water.
  • noun Same as peg, 7.
  • noun A piece of wood or other substance, usually in the form of a peg or cork, used to stop a hole in a vessel; a stopple; a bung or stopper of any kind.
  • noun A peg, wedge, or other appliance driven in, or used to stop a hole or fill a gap. ,
  • noun A wedge-pin forced between a rail and its chair on a railway.
  • noun A spigot driven into place, as in a barrel, in contradistinction to one screwed in.
  • noun A wooden stopper fitted in the opening of the pump on a ship's deck during a storm, to protect the water-tanks against lightning; a pump-stopper.
  • noun A small piece of some substance, as metallic foil, used by a dentist to fill the cavity of a decayed tooth.
  • noun A branch pipe from a watermain, leading to a point where a hose can be conveniently attached, and closed by a cap or plug; a fire-plug.
  • noun In die-sinking, a cylindrical piece of soft steel the end of which is fitted to a matrix.
  • noun A flat oblong cake of pressed tobacco.
  • noun A man's silk or dress hat; a plug-hat.
  • noun A worn, damaged, unfashionable, or otherwise injured article, which, by reason of its defects, has become undesirable, unsalable, or in a condition rendering it difficult to sell without a large reduction of its price, as a shelf-worn book, or an old horse worn down by hard work. Also old plug.
  • noun A short, thick-set person.
  • noun A workman who has served no regular apprenticeship.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Dutch, from Middle Dutch plugge.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

1606; from Dutch plug, from Middle Dutch plugge 'peg, plug', from Proto-Germanic *plugjaz (cf. Low German Plüg, German Pflock 'needle', Norwegian plug 'peg, small wedge'); akin to Lithuanian plúkti 'to strike, hew'.

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