gnaw /nɔː $ nɒː/ BrE AmE verb [intransitive, transitive always + adverb/preposition]
[ Language: Old English ; Origin: gnagan ]
to keep biting something hard SYN chew :
Dexter gnawed his pen thoughtfully.
A rat had gnawed a hole in the box.
gnaw at/on
The puppy was gnawing on a bone.
gnaw (away) at somebody/something phrasal verb
to make someone feel worried or frightened, over a period of time:
Something was gnawing at the back of his mind.
Doubt was gnawing away at her confidence.
• • •
THESAURUS
▪ bite to use your teeth to cut, crush, or chew something:
The dog bit me!
|
I sometimes bite my fingernails when I’m nervous.
|
He bit into the apple.
▪ chew to keep biting something that is in your mouth:
Helen was chewing a piece of gum.
|
He was chewing on a cigar.
▪ gnaw if an animal gnaws something, it bites it repeatedly:
The dog was in the yard gnawing on a bone.
▪ nip somebody/give somebody a nip to give someone or something a small sharp bite:
When I took the hamster out of his cage, he nipped me.
▪ nibble to take a lot of small bites from something:
A fish nibbled at the bait.
|
She sat at her desk, nibbling her sandwich.
▪ sink your teeth into somebody/something to bite someone or something with a lot of force, so that your teeth go right into them:
The dog sank its teeth into my leg.
|
He sank his teeth into the steak.
▪ chomp on something informal to bite something and chew it in a noisy way:
The donkey was chomping on a carrot.
|
He was chomping away on big slice of toast.
▪ sting if an insect stings you, it makes a very small hole in your skin. You use sting about bees, wasps, and scorpions, and bite about mosquitoes, ants, spiders, and snakes:
She stepped on a wasps’ nest and must have been stung at least 20 times.