wedge
Pronunciation: (wej), [key]
— n., v., wedged, wedg•ing.
—n.
- a piece of hard material with two principal faces meeting in a sharply acute angle, for raising, holding, or splitting objects by applying a pounding or driving force, as from a hammer. Cf.(def. 3b).
- a piece of anything of like shape: a wedge of pie.
- a cuneiform character or stroke of this shape.
- (formerly) an elongated area of relatively high pressure.
- something that serves to part, split, divide, etc.: The quarrel drove a wedge into the party organization.
- (formerly) a tactical formation generally in the form of awith the point toward the enemy.
- a club with an iron head the face of which is nearly horizontal, for lofting the ball, esp. out of sand traps and high grass.
- See
- haček.
- a hero sandwich.
- a wedge heel or shoe with such a heel.
—v.t.
- to separate or split with or as if with a wedge (often fol. by open, apart, etc.): to wedge open a log.
- to insert or fix with a wedge.
- to pack or fix tightly: to wedge clothes into a suitcase.
- to thrust, drive, fix, etc., like a wedge: He wedged himself through the narrow opening.
- to pound (clay) in order to remove air bubbles.
- to fell or direct the fall of (a tree) by driving wedges into the cut made by the saw.
—v.i.
- to force a way like a wedge (usually fol. by in, into, through, etc.): The box won't wedge into such a narrow space.
Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Copyright © 1997, by Random House, Inc., on Infoplease.