Hoak
To search through. To rummage. To dig around looking for something - in a drawer, a pocket, a handbag, a heap of papers. 'Hoaking through the cupboard' is a thorough domestic search.
Etymology
From Scots 'howk' (= to dig out, to scoop), itself from Older Scots 'houk' or 'holk' meaning to dig or hollow out, attested from the fourteenth century. The literal sense of digging (a turnip, a grave, a hole in the ground) gives the metaphorical sense of rummaging - hoaking through papers is digging through them looking for something.
In a sentence
"She's hoaking through the press looking for the good biscuits."
Historical notes
Hoak (or hoke) is one of the working Ulster Scots verbs that English splits across 'rummage', 'search', 'dig through', and 'fish around in'. The Ulster register implies thoroughness: hoaking is more determined than rummaging. The agricultural sense (hoaking a turnip out of the ground with a fork) is still alive in farm speech, and the household sense (hoaking for the lost keys) is everywhere.
Alternate spellings
hoke · howk
Sources
- Dictionaries of the Scots Language (DSL), entry HOWK v. · dictionary
- Macafee, Caroline. A Concise Ulster Dictionary. Oxford University Press, 1996. · dictionary