See nose to the grindstone in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
{
"etymology_text": "From the literal action of intensely working a grindstone, whether powered by a treadle or waterwheel. The expression initially implied punishment or abusive management, forcing the worker into intense work, and was used in the anonymous 1557 translation of Erasmus's Merry Dialogue as a hyperbolic punishment threatened for an abusive husband. It was later adapted to forcing oneself into similarly intense effort.",
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"ref": "a. 1533, John Frith, A Mirrour or Glasse to Know Thyselfe, sig. Avi v",
"text": "This Text holdeth their noses so hard to the grynde stone that it clean disfigureth their faces."
},
{
"ref": "1546, John Heywood, A Dialogue Conteinyng the Nomber in Effect of All the Prouerbes in the Englishe Tongue, sig. Bii",
"text": "I shall to reuenge former hurts,\nHold their noses to grinstone."
},
{
"ref": "1786, Robert Burns, Poems, page 188:",
"text": "Be to the Poor like onie whunstane,\nAnd haud their noses to the grunstane.",
"type": "quote"
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"ref": "1828, Lights & Shades of English Life, volume II, page 13:",
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"type": "quote"
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{
"ref": "1886 [1882], Henry James, The Point of View, London: Macmillan and Co.:",
"text": "I travelled energetically; I went everywhere and saw everything; took as many letters as possible, and made as many acquaintances. In short, I held my nose to the grindstone.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2001 August 26, Garrison Keillor, “In Search of Lake Wobegon”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:",
"text": "Thirty years ago, I lived in Stearns County with my wife and little boy in a rented farmhouse south of Freeport, an area of nose-to-the-grindstone German Catholics proud of their redneck reputation.",
"type": "quote"
}
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"synonyms": [
{
"_dis1": "47 53",
"sense": "apply oneself",
"word": "strive"
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"translations": [
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"tags": [
"usually"
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"word": "niska limassa (with paiskia/painaa töitä, raataa)"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "herkeämättä"
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{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "hartiavoimin"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich dahinterklemmen"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich abschinden"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich abrackern"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "it",
"lang": "Italian",
"sense": "Translations",
"tags": [
"masculine"
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"word": "lavoratore incallito"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "it",
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"masculine"
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"word": "lavoratore indefesso"
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"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "dar el callo"
},
{
"_dis1": "50 50",
"code": "es",
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"sense": "Translations",
"word": "andar a la brega"
}
],
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"William Hogarth"
],
"word": "nose to the grindstone"
}
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"etymology_text": "From the literal action of intensely working a grindstone, whether powered by a treadle or waterwheel. The expression initially implied punishment or abusive management, forcing the worker into intense work, and was used in the anonymous 1557 translation of Erasmus's Merry Dialogue as a hyperbolic punishment threatened for an abusive husband. It was later adapted to forcing oneself into similarly intense effort.",
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"text": "Nose to the grindstone, he was up all night.",
"type": "example"
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],
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"Hard at work."
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"(idiomatic) Hard at work."
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"word": "nose to the grindstone"
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"Terms with German translations",
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"Translation table header lacks gloss"
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"etymology_text": "From the literal action of intensely working a grindstone, whether powered by a treadle or waterwheel. The expression initially implied punishment or abusive management, forcing the worker into intense work, and was used in the anonymous 1557 translation of Erasmus's Merry Dialogue as a hyperbolic punishment threatened for an abusive husband. It was later adapted to forcing oneself into similarly intense effort.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "noses to the grindstone",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
},
{
"form": "noses to grindstones",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
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{
"ref": "a. 1533, John Frith, A Mirrour or Glasse to Know Thyselfe, sig. Avi v",
"text": "This Text holdeth their noses so hard to the grynde stone that it clean disfigureth their faces."
},
{
"ref": "1546, John Heywood, A Dialogue Conteinyng the Nomber in Effect of All the Prouerbes in the Englishe Tongue, sig. Bii",
"text": "I shall to reuenge former hurts,\nHold their noses to grinstone."
},
{
"ref": "1786, Robert Burns, Poems, page 188:",
"text": "Be to the Poor like onie whunstane,\nAnd haud their noses to the grunstane.",
"type": "quote"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Used to form idioms meaning \"to force someone to work hard or to focus intensely upon their work\"."
],
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"(idiomatic, obsolete) Used to form idioms meaning \"to force someone to work hard or to focus intensely upon their work\"."
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic",
"obsolete"
]
},
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"categories": [
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"examples": [
{
"ref": "1828, Lights & Shades of English Life, volume II, page 13:",
"text": "People whose heads are a little up in the world, have no occasion to keep their nose to the grindstone.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1886 [1882], Henry James, The Point of View, London: Macmillan and Co.:",
"text": "I travelled energetically; I went everywhere and saw everything; took as many letters as possible, and made as many acquaintances. In short, I held my nose to the grindstone.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2001 August 26, Garrison Keillor, “In Search of Lake Wobegon”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:",
"text": "Thirty years ago, I lived in Stearns County with my wife and little boy in a rented farmhouse south of Freeport, an area of nose-to-the-grindstone German Catholics proud of their redneck reputation.",
"type": "quote"
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"(idiomatic) Used to form idioms meaning \"to force oneself to work hard or to focus intensely upon one's work\"."
],
"tags": [
"idiomatic"
]
}
],
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{
"sense": "apply oneself",
"word": "strive"
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],
"translations": [
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"tags": [
"usually"
],
"word": "niska limassa (with paiskia/painaa töitä, raataa)"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "herkeämättä"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "hartiavoimin"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich dahinterklemmen"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich abschinden"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "sich abrackern"
},
{
"code": "it",
"lang": "Italian",
"sense": "Translations",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "lavoratore incallito"
},
{
"code": "it",
"lang": "Italian",
"sense": "Translations",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "lavoratore indefesso"
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{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "dar el callo"
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{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "Translations",
"word": "andar a la brega"
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"word": "nose to the grindstone"
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"etymology_text": "From the literal action of intensely working a grindstone, whether powered by a treadle or waterwheel. The expression initially implied punishment or abusive management, forcing the worker into intense work, and was used in the anonymous 1557 translation of Erasmus's Merry Dialogue as a hyperbolic punishment threatened for an abusive husband. It was later adapted to forcing oneself into similarly intense effort.",
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{
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"English terms with usage examples"
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"text": "Nose to the grindstone, he was up all night.",
"type": "example"
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"Hard at work."
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"(idiomatic) Hard at work."
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],
"word": "head down, bum up"
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"word": "nose to the grindstone"
}
Download raw JSONL data for nose to the grindstone meaning in English (6.7kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-11-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-10-02 using wiktextract (fbeafe8 and 7f03c9b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.