hug

From earlier hugge (“to embrace, clasp with the arms”) (1560), probably representing a conflation of huck (“to crouch, huddle down”) and Old Norse hugga (“to comfort, console”), from hugr (“mind, heart, thought”), from Proto-Germanic *hugiz (“mind, thought, sense”), cognate with Icelandic hugga (“to comfort”), Old English hyġe (“thought”) (whence high (Etymology 2)).

• enPR: hŭg, IPA^(key): /hʌɡ/

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• Rhymes: -ʌɡ

hug (plural hugs)

1. A close embrace, especially when charged with an emotion such as affection, joy, relief, lust, anger, aggression, compassion, and the like, as opposed to being characterized by formality, equivocation or ambivalence (a half-embrace or "little hug").
2. A particular grip in wrestling.

hug (third-person singular simple present hugs, present participle hugging, simple past and past participle hugged)

1. (intransitive, obsolete) To crouch; to huddle as with cold.
   • 1885, M. Quad, Field, Fort and Fleet, page 354:

     They had a slight breast work, and they hugged down behind it and waited.

   • 1892, Paul Boyton, The Story of Paul Boyton:

     That is why they are so little known and never explored. During the day, when a Chilean cruiser nosed around uncomfortably close, the little sloop would be hugged under the lee of one of the islands, sail lowered and anchor dropped.

   • 1892, The Sewanee Review - Volume 66, page 263:

     bright rocks whose stain of emerald or quartz shaft of shine the starfish hugged beneath the tide .

   • 2014, Thomas Gifford, The Cavanaugh Quest:

     She put her feet on a rung and hugged down against her knees, making herself even smaller.

   • 2020, Zhenyinfang, Marital Passion:

     Zhai Tingshen stood at the window upstairs, his black eyes staring intently at the figure that was tightly hugged below.

2. (intransitive) To cling closely together.
3. (transitive) To embrace by holding closely, especially in the arms.

   Billy hugged Danny until he felt better.

4. (transitive) To stay close to.

   to hug the shore, to hug the coastline

   • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VIII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:

     We toted in the wood and got the fire going nice and comfortable. Lord James still set in one of the chairs and Applegate had cabbaged the other and was hugging the stove.

   • 2020 October 21, Dr Joseph Brennan, “From the main line and over the waves”, in Rail, page 60:

     Gourock also boasted a pier railway, although its pier hugged the shore rather than jutting into the bay.

5. (transitive, figurative) To hold fast; to cling to; to cherish.
   • 1665, Joseph Glanvill, Scepsis Scientifica: Or, Confest Ignorance, the Way to Science; […], London: […] E. C[otes] for Henry Eversden […], →OCLC:

     We hug intellectual deformities, if they bear our names

• (crouch): hunker, squat, stoop
• (cling closely): cleave, stick; see also Thesaurus:adhere
• (embrace): accoll (obsolete), coll, embrace; see also Thesaurus:embrace
• (stay close to):
• (hold fast): treasure

• cuddle
• huggle
• kiss
• snuggle
• squeeze

• Ghu, ghu, ugh

• IPA^(key): /hoɡ/, [ˈhɔɡ̊]

From Old Norse hǫgg, verbal noun to hǫggva (“to hew”) (Danish hugge).

hug n (singular definite hugget, plural indefinite hug)

1. stroke
2. slash
3. cut

• “hug,1” in Den Danske Ordbog

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• IPA^(key): /huɡ/, [ˈhuɡ̊]

hug (uninflected)

1. squat

• “hug,2” in Den Danske Ordbog

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

• IPA^(key): /hoɡ/, [ˈhɔɡ̊]

hug

1. imperative of hugge

hug m

1. indefinite accusative singular of hugur

From Old Irish co (“to”). Compare Irish chuig and Scottish Gaelic gu.

hug

1. to

hug

1. past of toyr

• hau

From Old Norse hugr (“thought”), from Proto-Germanic *hugiz og uncertain origin. Cognates include Norwegian Bokmål hu.

• IPA^(key): /hʉːɡ/, /hʉː/

hug m (definite singular hugen, indefinite plural hugar, definite plural hugane)

1. (chiefly uncountable) mind
2. (chiefly uncountable, collective) one's thoughts
3. (chiefly uncountable) wish, desire
   • 1971, Olav H. Hauge, T'ao Ch'ien:

     Meir enn fyrr har han hug å draga seg attende til ein slik hageflekk.

     More than before, he has a desire to retreat to such a small garden.

4. (uncountable, folklore) an itch in the nose which comes when someone is thinking of one, or as a warning that someone is about to arrive

hug

1. (predicative) keen, eager

• “hug” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

hug

1. accusative/dative singular of hugr