Other forms: heaving, heaved, heaves
To heave is to lift, pull or throw something heavy using everything you have. You heave a sack of compost onto your shoulder, heave a suitcase into the boot, heave a wardrobe six inches across the floor and stop for breath.
The effort is the point — nobody heaves a pencil. The word also covers slow, heavy movement up and down: a chest heaving after a run, the sea heaving under the boat. It means to retch as well, which is what dry heaves are. A heavy sigh is one you heave: she heaved a sigh and picked up the phone. The past is heaved, except at sea, where the old form survives in hove into view. And a place described as heaving is packed with moving people: the pub was heaving.
1verbheaveTo lift, pull or throw something heavy with great effort.
“They heaved the piano up the last three steps.”
2verbriseTo rise and fall heavily.
“His shoulders heaved as he caught his breath.”
3verbdeepTo let out a deep breath or sound with effort.
“She heaved a sigh and started the letter again.”
4verbretchTo retch, or feel about to be sick.
“The smell from the bins made him heave.”
5nounstrongA strong pull, push or lift.
“One last heave and the door came free.”
heave is a way of lifting.
Heave is Old English hebban, from Proto-Germanic *habjaną, 'to take up, lift', on a Proto-Indo-European root *kap-. That root spread far: Latin capiō, 'to take', German heben, Albanian kap, 'to grasp'. English have belongs to the same family, which makes heaving a thing and having it two branches of one very old idea about getting your hands on something.
Middle English
heven
English, today
heave
From Middle English heven. From Middle English heven, hebben, from Old English hebban, from Proto-West Germanic habbjan, from Proto-Germanic habjaną (“to take up, lift”), from Proto-Indo-European kapyéti, from the root kap-. See also have. 2
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA