Dock Meaning
/dɒk/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounAny of the genus Rumex of coarse weedy plants with small green flowers related to buckwheat, especially bitter dock (Rumex obtusifolius), and used as potherbs and in folk medicine, especially in curing nettle rash.
nounA burdock plant, or the leaves of that plant.
Sentence Examples
The ship is now in dock for a refit.
Tom was sunbathing on the dock.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The large cargo ship will ____ at the port tomorrow morning.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The ship is now in ____ for a refit.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English dokke, from Old English docce, from Proto-West Germanic *dokkā, from Proto-Germanic *dukkǭ (compare Old Danish dokke (“water-dock”), West Flemish dokke, dokkebladeren (“coltsfoot, butterbur”)), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰew- (“dark”) (compare Latvian duga (“scum, slime on water”)).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"And vnder neath him his courageous ſteed, / The fierce Spumador trode them downe like docks […]"
— 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 352:
"The Dock is about 1 inch thick, and two inches broad, like an Apothecaries Spatule. Of what length the whole, is uncertain, this being only part of it, though it looks as if cut off near the Buttock"
— 1681, Nehemiah Grew, Musæum Regalis Societatis. Or A Catalogue & Description of the Natural and Artificial Rarities Belonging to the Royal Society and Preserved at Gresham Colledge. […], London: […] W. Rawlins, for the author, →OCLC:
"And on a Cuſhion ſtuffed with Flocks, / She clapt her dainty pair of Docks."
— 1665, Charles Cotton, Scarronnides:
"The Celebrity, by arts unknown, induced Mrs. Judge Short and two other ladies to call at Mohair on a certain afternoon when Mr. Cooke was trying a trotter on the track.[…]Their example was followed by others at a time when the master of Mohair was superintending in person the docking of some two-year-olds, and equally invisible."
— 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC, pages 58–59:
"The team have been docked six points at Paris 2024 and Priestman received a one-year football ban from world governing body Fifa."
— 2024 July 28, “Priestman 'heartbroken' by drone scandal as funding pulled”, in BBC:
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The large cargo ship will ____ at the port tomorrow morning.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The ship is now in ____ for a refit.