hug

noun

1. A close embrace, especially when charged with an emotion such as affection, joy, relief, lust, anger, aggression, compassion, and the like, as opposed to being characterized by formality, equivocation or ambivalence (a half-embrace or "little hug").
2. A particular grip in wrestling.

verb

1. (intransitive, obsolete)To crouch; to huddle as with cold.

   “They had a slight breast work, and they hugged down behind it and waited.”

   “That is why they are so little known and never explored. During the day, when a Chilean cruiser nosed around uncomfortably close, the little sloop would be hugged under the lee of one of the islands, sail lowered and anchor dropped.”

   “bright rocks whose stain of emerald or quartz shaft of shine the starfish hugged beneath the tide .”

   “She put her feet on a rung and hugged down against her knees, making herself even smaller.”

   “Zhai Tingshen stood at the window upstairs, his black eyes staring intently at the figure that was tightly hugged below.”

2. (intransitive)To cling closely together.
3. (reciprocal, transitive)To embrace by holding closely, especially in the arms.

   “Billy hugged Danny until he felt better.”

   “They hugged for what seemed like an eternity.”

4. (transitive)To stay close to.

   “to hug the shore, to hug the coastline”

   “We toted in the wood and got the fire going nice and comfortable. Lord James still set in one of the chairs and Applegate had cabbaged the other and was hugging the stove.”

   “Gourock also boasted a pier railway, although its pier hugged the shore rather than jutting into the bay.”

5. (figuratively, transitive)To hold fast; to cling to; to cherish.

   “We hug intellectual deformities, if they bear our names”