Verb

(graz)

To feed or supply (cattle, sheep, etc.) with grass; to furnish pasture for.

* Jonathan Swift

a field or two to graze his cows

* 1999:' Although it is perfectly good meadowland, none of the villagers has ever '''grazed animals on the meadow on the other side of the wall. — ''Stardust , Neil Gaiman, page 4 (2001 Perennial Edition).

(ambitransitive) To feed on; to eat (growing herbage); to eat grass from (a pasture); to browse.

Cattle graze in the meadows.

* Alexander Pope

The lambs with wolves shall graze the verdant mead.

* 1993 , John Montroll, Origami Inside-Out (page 41)

The bird [Canada goose] is more often found on land than other waterfowl because of its love for seeds and grains. The long neck is well adapted for grazing .

To tend (cattle, etc.) while grazing.

* Shakespeare

when Jacob grazed his uncle Laban's sheep

To rub or touch lightly the surface of (a thing) in passing.

the bullet grazed the wall

* 1851 ,

But in that gale, the port, the land, is that ship’s direst jeopardy; she must fly all hospitality; one touch of land, though it but graze the keel, would make her shudder through and through.

To cause a slight wound to; to scratch.

to graze one's knee

To yield grass for grazing.

* Francis Bacon

The sewers must be kept so as the water may not stay too long in the spring; for then the ground continueth the wet, whereby it will never graze to purpose that year.

Verb

To move (one object) while maintaining contact with another object over some area, with pressure and friction.

* , chapter=7

, title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“[…] This is Mr. Churchill, who, as you are aware, is good enough to come to us for his diaconate, and, as we hope, for much longer; and being a gentleman of independent means, he declines to take any payment.” Saying this Walden rubbed his hands together and smiled contentedly.}}

To rub something against (a second thing).

* Sir T. Elyot

It shall be expedient, after that body is cleaned, to rub the body with a coarse linen cloth.

To be rubbed against something.

To spread a substance thinly over; to smear.

meat rubbed with spices before barbecuing

* Milton

The smoothed plank, / New rubbed with balm.

(dated) To move or pass with difficulty.

To scour; to burnish; to polish; to brighten; to cleanse; often with up'' or ''over .

to rub up silver

* South

The whole business of our redemption is to rub over the defaced copy of the creation.

To hinder; to cross; to thwart.

* Shakespeare

'Tis the duke's pleasure, / Whose disposition, all the world well knows, / Will not be rubbed nor stopped.