*driv*

v. t. [ imp. Drove formerly Drave (drāv); p. p. Driven p. pr. & vb. n. Driving. ] [ AS. drīfan; akin to OS. drīban, D. drijven, OHG. trīban, G. treiben, Icel. drīfa, Goth. dreiban. Cf. Drift, Drove. ] 1. To impel or urge onward by force in a direction away from one, or along before one; to push forward; to compel to move on; to communicate motion to; as, to drive cattle; to drive a nail; smoke drives persons from a room. [ 1913 Webster ]

A storm came on and drove them into Pylos. Jowett (Thucyd. ). [ 1913 Webster ]

Shield pressed on shield, and man drove man along. Pope. [ 1913 Webster ]

Go drive the deer and drag the finny prey. Pope. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. To urge on and direct the motions of, as the beasts which draw a vehicle, or the vehicle borne by them; hence, also, to take in a carriage; to convey in a vehicle drawn by beasts; as, to drive a pair of horses or a stage; to drive a person to his own door. [ 1913 Webster ]

How . . . proud he was to drive such a brother! Thackeray. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. To urge, impel, or hurry forward; to force; to constrain; to urge, press, or bring to a point or state; as, to drive a person by necessity, by persuasion, by force of circumstances, by argument, and the like. “ Enough to drive one mad.” Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]

He, driven to dismount, threatened, if I did not do the like, to do as much for my horse as fortune had done for his. Sir P. Sidney. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. To carry or; to keep in motion; to conduct; to prosecute. [ Now used only colloquially. ] Bacon. [ 1913 Webster ]

The trade of life can not be driven without partners. Collier. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. To clear, by forcing away what is contained. [ 1913 Webster ]

To drive the country, force the swains away. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

6. (Mining) To dig Horizontally; to cut a horizontal gallery or tunnel. Tomlinson. [ 1913 Webster ]

7. To pass away; -- said of time. [ Obs. ] Chaucer. [ 1913 Webster ]

8. Specif., in various games, as tennis, baseball, etc., to propel (the ball) swiftly by a direct stroke or forcible throw. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

9. to operate (a vehicle) while it is on motion, by manipulating the controls, such as the steering, propulsion, and braking mechanisms. [ PJC ]

n. 1. In various games, as tennis, cricket, etc., the act of player who drives the ball; the stroke or blow; the flight of the ball, etc., so driven. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

2. (Golf) A stroke from the tee, generally a full shot made with a driver; also, the distance covered by such a stroke. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

☞ Drive, in all its senses, implies forcible or violent action. It is the reverse of to lead. To drive a body is to move it by applying a force behind; to lead is to cause to move by applying the force before, or in front. It takes a variety of meanings, according to the objects by which it is followed; as, to drive an engine, to direct and regulate its motions; to drive logs, to keep them in the current of a river and direct them in their course; to drive feathers or down, to place them in a machine, which, by a current of air, drives off the lightest to one end, and collects them by themselves. “My thrice-driven bed of down.” Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. 1. To rush and press with violence; to move furiously. [ 1913 Webster ]

Fierce Boreas drove against his flying sails. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

Under cover of the night and a driving tempest. Prescott. [ 1913 Webster ]

Time driveth onward fast,
And in a little while our lips are dumb. Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. To be forced along; to be impelled; to be moved by any physical force or agent; to be driven. [ 1913 Webster ]

The hull drives on, though mast and sail be torn. Byron. [ 1913 Webster ]

The chaise drives to Mr. Draper's chambers. Thackeray. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. To go by carriage; to pass in a carriage; to proceed by directing or urging on a vehicle or the animals that draw it; as, the coachman drove to my door. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. To press forward; to aim, or tend, to a point; to make an effort; to strive; -- usually with at. [ 1913 Webster ]

Let them therefore declare what carnal or secular interest he drove at. South. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. To distrain for rent. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

6. (Golf) To make a drive, or stroke from the tee. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

7. to go from one place to another in a vehicle, serving as the operator of the vehicle; to drive{ 9 } a vehicle from one location to another. He drove from New York to Boston in four hours. [ PJC ]

To let drive, to aim a blow; to strike with force; to attack. “Four rogues in buckram let drive at me.” Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

p. p. Driven. [ Obs. ] Chaucer. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. The act of driving; a trip or an excursion in a carriage, as for exercise or pleasure; -- distinguished from a ride taken on horseback. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A place suitable or agreeable for driving; a road prepared for driving. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. Violent or rapid motion; a rushing onward or away; esp., a forced or hurried dispatch of business. [ 1913 Webster ]

The Murdstonian drive in business. M. Arnold. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. In type founding and forging, an impression or matrix, formed by a punch drift. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. A collection of objects that are driven; a mass of logs to be floated down a river. [ Colloq. ]

Syn. -- See Ride. [ 1913 Webster ]

6. a private road; a driveway. [ PJC ]

7. a strong psychological motivation to perform some activity. [ PJC ]

8. (Computers) a device for reading or writing data from or to a data storage medium, as a disk drive, a tape drive, a CD drive, etc. [ PJC ]

9. an organized effort by a group to accomplish a goal within a limited period of time; as, a fund-raising drive. [ PJC ]

10. a physiological function of an organism motivating it to perform specific behaviors; as, the sex drive. [ PJC ]

11. (Football) the period during which one team sustains movement of the ball toward the opponent's goal without losing possession of the ball; as, a long drive downfield. [ PJC ]

12. an act of driving a vehicle, especially an automobile; the journey undertaken by driving an automobile; as, to go for a drive in the country. [ PJC ]

13. the mechanism which causes the moving parts of a machine to move; as, a belt drive. [ PJC ]

14. the way in which the propulsive force of a vehicle is transmitted to the road; as, a car with four-wheel drive, front-wheel drive, etc. [ PJC ]

n. A drift; a tool for setting bolts home. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. accomplished while driving past in a vehicle; as, a drive-by shooting. [ PJC ]

n. any installation designed to accommodate patrons while staying in their automobiles; especially an outdoor movie theater in which patrons park in their vehicles to watch the movie. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. arranged to allow business to be transacted while patrons remain in their vehicles; as, a drive-in window at a bank.
Syn. -- drive-through. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. a window at a business establishment, such as a bank or restaurant, where patrons may transact business or order goods while staying in their automobiles; as, to cash a check at the drive-in window of the bank. [ PJC ]

v. i. [ imp. & p. p. Driveled r Drivelled; p. pr. & vb. n. Driveling or Drivelling. ] [ Cf. OE. dravelen, drabelen, drevelen, drivelen, to slaver, and E. drabble. Cf. Drool. ] 1. To slaver; to let spittle drop or flow from the mouth, like a child, idiot, or dotard. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. [ Perh. a different word: cf. Icel. drafa to talk thick. ] To be weak or foolish; to dote; as, a driveling hero; driveling love. Shak. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. Slaver; saliva flowing from the mouth. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Inarticulate or unmeaning utterance; foolish talk; babble. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A driveler; a fool; an idiot. [ Obs. ] Sir P. Sidney. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. A servant; a drudge. [ Obs. ] Huloet. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A slaverer; a slabberer; an idiot; a fool. [ Written also driveller. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

p. p. of Drive. Also adj. [ 1913 Webster ]

Driven well, a well made by driving a tube into the earth to an aqueous stratum; -- called also drive well. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A pipe for forcing into the earth. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ From Drive. ] 1. One who, or that which, drives; the person or thing that urges or compels anything else to move onward. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. The person who drives beasts or a carriage; a coachman; a charioteer, etc.; hence, also, one who controls the movements of a any vehicle. [ 1913 Webster +PJC ]

3. An overseer of a gang of slaves or gang of convicts at their work. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. (Mach.) A part that transmits motion to another part by contact with it, or through an intermediate relatively movable part, as a gear which drives another, or a lever which moves another through a link, etc. Specifically:

(a) The driving wheel of a locomotive. (b) An attachment to a lathe, spindle, or face plate to turn a carrier. (c) A crossbar on a grinding mill spindle to drive the upper stone. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. (Naut.) The after sail in a ship or bark, being a fore-and-aft sail attached to a gaff; a spanker. Totten. [ 1913 Webster ]

6. An implement used for driving; as: (a) A mallet. (b) A tamping iron. (c) A cooper's hammer for driving on barrel hoops. (d) A wooden-headed golf club with a long shaft, for playing the longest strokes. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

Driver ant (Zool.), a species of African stinging ant; one of the visiting ants (Anomma arcens); -- so called because they move about in vast armies, and drive away or devour all insects and other small animals. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. a rotating shaft that transmits power from the engine to the point of application. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. arranged to allow business to be transacted or sights to be seen while patrons remain in their vehicles; as, a drive-through car wash; a drive-through safari park. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. A passage or way along or through which a carriage may be driven. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. 1. Having great force of impulse; as, a driving wind or storm. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Communicating force; impelling; as, a driving shaft. [ 1913 Webster ]

Driving axle, the axle of a driving wheel, as in a locomotive. --
Driving box (Locomotive), the journal box of a driving axle. See Illust. of Locomotive. --
Driving note (Mus.), a syncopated note; a tone begun on a weak part of a measure and held through the next accented part, thus anticipating the accent and driving it through. --
Driving spring, a spring fixed upon the box of the driving axle of a locomotive engine to support the weight and deaden shocks. [ Eng. ] Weale. --
Driving wheel (Mach.), a wheel that communicates motion; one of the large wheels of a locomotive to which the connecting rods of the engine are attached; -- called also, simply, driver. See Illust. of Locomotive. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. The act of forcing or urging something along; the act of pressing or moving on furiously. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Tendency; drift. [ R. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. To drive about; to drive here and there. [ Obs. ] Rom. of R. [ 1913 Webster ]

adv. With full speed. [ Colloq. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Driven to the end, as a nail; driven close. [ 1913 Webster ]

adj. same as automated.
Syn. -- automated. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. (Mach.) Driven or actuated by a motor, esp. by an individual electric motor. An electric motor forms an integral part of many machine tools in numerous modern machine shops. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

v. t. & i. To drive too hard, or far, or beyond strength. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. (Machinery) A gearing device which causes the drive shaft of an automobile or other machine to rotate at a speed greater than that of the engine crankshaft. [ PJC ]

2. (Automotive) The gear setting of a motor vehicle at which the overdrive{ 1 } is operative; as, cruising at 80 mph in overdrive. [ PJC ]

3. Hence: [ fig. ] A state of unusually intense activity; as, when they got their new supercomputer, their research kicked into overdrive; one look at her made his heart jump into overdrive; -- used mostly of the activities of persons or groups. [ PJC ]

n. a motorist who owns the vehicle that he/she drives. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. (Chem.) The quality or state of being quadrivalent; tetravalence. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ Quadri- + L. valens, -entis, p. pr. See Valence. ] (Chem.) Having a valence of four; capable of combining with, being replaced by, or compared with, four monad atoms; tetravalent; -- said of certain atoms and radicals; thus, carbon and silicon are quadrivalent elements. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ Quadri- + valve: cf. F. quadrivalve. ] (Bot.) Dehiscent into four similar parts; four-valved; as, a quadrivalve pericarp. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. (Arch.) A door, shutter, or the like, having four folds. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Having four valves; quadrivalve. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. quadrivium a place where four ways meet; quattuor four + via way. ] Having four ways meeting in a point. B. Jonson. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. One of the four “liberal arts” making up the quadrivium. [ 1913 Webster ]

‖n. [ L. ] The four “liberal arts, ” arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy; -- so called by the schoolmen. See Trivium. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A tool for turning screws so as to drive them into their place. It has a thin end which enters the nick in the head of the screw. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. (Zool.) The common American bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus); -- so called because one of its notes resembles the sound made in driving a stake into the mud. Called also meadow hen, and Indian hen. [ 1913 Webster ]