Skip to main content
hand mower

hand mower

3.7
A tool you push to cut grass without a motor
  • noun
translation icon : cortacésped manual
  • She pushes a hand mower, the last lawn cut of the season before raking starts.

Examples

  • One weekend that spring, she told me it was time to buy a lawn mower for the little patch of grass that separated our building from the street, to replace the hand mower that had finally grown too rusted to push.

    Fiction book (1999)
  • One weekend that spring, she told me it was time to buy a lawn mower for the little patch of grass that separated our building from the street, to replace the hand mower that had finally grown too rusted to push.

  • She pushes a hand mower, the last lawn cut of the season before raking starts.

    Fiction book (1993)
  • Every other Sunday morning, Stacia mowed the small front lawn with a rusty hand mower.

Synonyms

mower
vshand mower
69 1.0

A machine that cuts grass on lawns

is pushed manually and has no motor
lawn mower
vshand mower
28 2.1

A machine that cuts grass on a lawn

is pushed manually and lacks any engine
riding mower
vshand mower
  • US
4 3.5

A machine you sit on to cut grass

is pushed manually and is not meant to be sat on
power mower
vshand mower
  • US
2 3.2

A machine that cuts grass using a small engine

is pushed manually and has no engine
motor mower
vshand mower
3.3

A machine with a small engine that cuts grass

is pushed manually and therefore has no engine

Antonyms

2 3.2

A machine that cuts grass using a small engine

How Powerful

riding mower
  • US
4 3.5
hand mower
3.7
scythe
12 6.7

Surface Forms

hand mower singular
hand mowers plural

Morphology

hand + mower

The meaning is directly and compositionally derived from 'hand' (manual, by hand) + 'mower' (device for trimming grass); the compound denotes a mower operated by hand. This noun-noun compounding pattern and the concept of a manually operated tool are cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will readily infer the MWE meaning.

Etymology

The noun hand mower shows a simple picture: a small mower pushed by your hand rather than run by a motor. That's why it means a lawn mower used 'by hand' or 'without a motor'.