Trowel vs Spade - What's the difference?
trowel | spade |
A mason’s tool, used in spreading and dressing mortar, and breaking bricks to shape them.
A gardener’s tool, shaped like a scoop, used in taking up plants, stirring soil etc.
A tool used for smoothing a mold.
To apply a substance with a trowel.
* 2014 , Steve Rose, "
A garden tool with a handle and a flat blade for digging. Not to be confused with a shovel which is used for moving earth or other materials.
* 1898 , , Chapter 4
A playing card marked with the symbol .
(offensive, ethnic slur) A black person.
A cutting instrument used in flensing a whale.
To turn over soil with a spade to loosen the ground for planting.
(videogaming) To collect and statistically analyze data, for the purpose of determining the underlying random number generator structure or numeric formula.
As nouns the difference between trowel and spade
is that trowel is a mason’s tool, used in spreading and dressing mortar, and breaking bricks to shape them while spade is a garden tool with a handle and a flat blade for digging. Not to be confused with a shovel which is used for moving earth or other materials.As verbs the difference between trowel and spade
is that trowel is to apply a substance with a trowel while spade is to turn over soil with a spade to loosen the ground for planting.trowel
English
Noun
(en noun)- I need to dig a hole for these begonias; would you pass me that trowel ?
Derived terms
* pointing-trowelVerb
- ''He troweled the coarse mix with a twist, leaving a pattern of arcs.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes: a primate scream - first look review", The Guardian , 1 July 2014:
- The whole Planet of the Apes set-up has been ripe for metaphor – from slavery and Afro-American revolution to European conquest of the Americas, even the war on terror. But mercifully, there's no big subtext being troweled on here.
spade
English
(wikipedia spade)Etymology 1
From (etyl) spadu, spada, from (etyl) .Noun
(en noun)- 'Make your mind easy,' Ratsey said; 'I have dug too often in this graveyard for any to wonder if they see me with a spade .'
- I've got only one spade in my hand.