pick

English Online Dictionary. What means pick‎? What does pick mean?

English

Etymology

From Middle English piken, picken, pikken, from Old English *piccian, *pīcian (attested in pīcung (“a pricking”)), and pīcan, pȳcan (“to pick, prick, pluck”), both from Proto-West Germanic *pikkōn, from Proto-Germanic *pikkōną (“to pick, peck, prick, knock”), from Proto-Indo-European *bew-, *bu- (“to make a dull, hollow sound”). Doublet of pitch and peck.

Cognate with Dutch pikken (“to pick”), German picken (“to pick, peck”), Old Norse pikka, pjakka (whence Icelandic pikka (“to pick, prick”), Swedish picka (“to pick, peck”)).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɪk/, [pʰɪk]
• Homophone: pic
• Rhymes: -ɪk

Noun

pick (plural picks)

1. A tool used for digging; a pickaxe.
2. (nautical, slang) An anchor.
3. A pointed hammer used for dressing millstones.
4. A tool for unlocking a lock without the original key; a lock pick, picklock.
5. A comb with long widely spaced teeth, for use with tightly curled hair.
6. (music) A tool used for strumming the strings of a guitar; a plectrum.
7. (obsolete) A pike or spike; the sharp point fixed in the center of a buckler.
8. A choice; ability to choose.
9. That which would be picked or chosen first; the best.
10. (Australia) Pasture; feed, for animals. [from 20th c.]
11. (basketball) A screen.
12. (lacrosse) An offensive tactic in which a player stands so as to block a defender from reaching a teammate.
13. (American football) An interception.
14. (baseball) A good defensive play by an infielder.
15. (baseball) A pickoff.
16. (printing, dated) A particle of ink or paper embedded in the hollow of a letter, filling up its face, and causing a spot on a printed sheet.
17. (art, painting) That which is picked in, as with a pointed pencil, to correct an unevenness in a picture.
18. (weaving) The blow that drives the shuttle, used in calculating the speed of a loom (in picks per minute); hence, in describing the fineness of a fabric, a weft thread.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

pick (third-person singular simple present picks, present participle picking, simple past and past participle picked)

1. To grasp and pull with the fingers or fingernails.

   Don't pick at that scab.

   He picked his nose.

3. To harvest a fruit or vegetable for consumption by removing it from the plant to which it is attached; to harvest an entire plant by removing it from the ground.

4. To pull apart or away, especially with the fingers; to pluck.

5. To take up; especially, to gather from here and there; to collect; to bring together.

6. To remove something from somewhere with a pointed instrument, with the fingers, or with the teeth.
7. To decide upon, from a set of options; to select.

8. (transitive) To seek (a fight or quarrel) where the opportunity arises.
9. (cricket) To recognise the type of ball being bowled by a bowler by studying the position of the hand and arm as the ball is released.

10. (music) To pluck the individual strings of a musical instrument or to play such an instrument.

11. To open (a lock) with a wire, lock pick, etc.
12. To eat slowly, sparingly, or by morsels; to nibble.
13. To do anything fastidiously or carefully, or by attending to small things; to select something with care.

14. To steal; to pilfer.
15. (obsolete) To throw; to pitch.

    Synonyms: fling, hurl; see also Thesaurus:throw
16. (dated) To peck at, as a bird with its beak; to strike at with anything pointed; to act upon with a pointed instrument; to pierce; to prick, as with a pin.
17. (transitive, intransitive) To separate or open by means of a sharp point or points.
18. (basketball) To screen.
19. (American football, informal) To intercept a pass from the offense as a defensive player.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• mattock

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɪk/
• Rhymes: -ɪk

Verb

pick

1. singular imperative of picken
2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of picken

Swedish

Noun

pick c

1. (colloquial) a dick (penis)

Declension

See also

• kuk

References

• pick in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• pick in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• pick in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)

Yola

Etymology

From Middle English pikke, from Old English pīc, from Proto-West Germanic *pīk.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɪk/

Noun

pick (plural pikkès)

1. pike

References

• Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828) William Barnes, editor, A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published 1867, page 61