General
navvy
What does navvy mean?
A heavy-graft manual labourer, historically the men who dug Britain's canals, railways, and roads by hand. Today still used for groundworkers and trench diggers. The word carries weight: navvies built the country with picks and shovels.
"We need a couple of navvies on the trench tomorrow."
Origin
Short for 'navigator', the 18th-century term for canal builders who dug the inland 'navigations'.
Frequently asked questions
What does Navvy mean?
It's a term for a manual labourer, especially one working on heavy excavation or groundworks.
How do you use Navvy in a sentence?
"My grandad was a navvy who dug canals and railway cuttings by hand."
Where does Navvy come from?
It's short for 'navigator,' a term historically used for the labourers who dug Britain's canals (the 'navigations') and later railways.
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