Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Ax \Ax\, Axe \Axe\,, n. [OE. ax, axe, AS. eax, [ae]x, acas; akin
   to D. akse, OS. accus, OHG. acchus, G. axt, Icel. ["o]x,
   ["o]xi, Sw. yxe, Dan. ["o]kse, Goth. aqizi, Gr. ?, L. ascia;
   not akin to E. acute.]
   A tool or instrument of steel, or of iron with a steel edge
   or blade, for felling trees, chopping and splitting wood,
   hewing timber, etc. It is wielded by a wooden helve or
   handle, so fixed in a socket or eye as to be in the same
   plane with the blade. The broadax, or carpenter's ax, is an
   ax for hewing timber, made heavier than the chopping ax, and
   with a broader and thinner blade and a shorter handle.

   Note: The ancient battle-ax had sometimes a double edge.

   Note: The word is used adjectively or in combination; as,
         axhead or ax head; ax helve; ax handle; ax shaft;
         ax-shaped; axlike.

   Note: This word was originally spelt with e, axe; and so also
         was nearly every corresponding word of one syllable:
         as, flaxe, taxe, waxe, sixe, mixe, pixe, oxe, fluxe,
         etc. This superfluous e is not dropped; so that, in
         more than a hundred words ending in x, no one thinks of
         retaining the e except in axe. Analogy requires its
         exclusion here.

   Note: ``The spelling ax is better on every ground, of
         etymology, phonology, and analogy, than axe, which has
         of late become prevalent.'' --New English Dict.
         (Murray).

Ax \Ax\, v. t. & i. [OE. axien and asken. See {Ask}.]
   To ask; to inquire or inquire of.

   Note: This word is from Saxon, and is as old as the English
         language. Formerly it was in good use, but now is
         regarded as a vulgarism. It is still dialectic in
         England, and is sometimes heard among the uneducated in
         the United States. ``And Pilate axide him, Art thou
         king of Jewis?'' ``Or if he axea fish.'' --Wyclif.
         'bdThe king axed after your Grace's welfare.'' --Pegge.

Source : WordNet®

ax
     v 1: chop or split with an ax; "axe wood" [syn: {axe}]
     2: terminate; "The NSF axed the research program and stopped
        funding it" [syn: {axe}]
     [also: {axes} (pl)]

ax
     n : an edge tool with a heavy bladed head mounted across a
         handle [syn: {axe}]
     [also: {axes} (pl)]