Pronunciations (6)
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/ˈbʌk/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
- Received-Pronunciation
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/ˈbʊk/
Pronunciation notes
- Ireland
- Northern-England
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/ˈbɜk/
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/ˈbäk/
Pronunciation notes
- Australia
- New-Zealand
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/ˈbɐ̞k/
Pronunciation notes
- Australia
- New-Zealand
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bʌk
Noun
A male deer, antelope, sheep, goat, rabbit, hare, and sometimes the male of other animals such as the hamster, ferret, salmonid, shad, skunk and kangaroo.
An uncastrated sheep, a ram.
Usage- US usage
An antelope of either sex; compare with Afrikaans bok.
Usage- Africa
- Examples
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There are all kinds of game in the valley, and you are unlucky if you do not see a giraffe or an ostrich, or at least a herd of buck.
The sound made by a chicken.
A young buck; an adventurous, impetuous, dashing, or high-spirited young man.
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Swankey of the Body Guard himself, that dangerous youth, and the greatest buck of all the Indian army now on leave, was one day discovered by Major Dobbin tête-à-tête with Amelia, and describing the sport of pig-sticking to her with great humour and eloquence […]
A fop or dandy.
Usage- UK usage
- Obsolete
- Examples
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This pusillanimous creature thinks himself, and would be thought, a buck.
More examples (1)
The Captain was then a buck and dandy, during the reign of those two successive dynasties, of the first rank of the second order ; the characteristic of which very respectable rank of fashionables I hold to be, that their spurs impinge upon the pavement oftener than upon the sides of a horse.
A black or Native American man.
Usage- US usage
- Dated
- Derogatory
- Examples
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As we crossed Blackwell's Island a limousine passed us, driven by a white chauffeur, in which sat three modish negroes, two bucks and a girl.
It as not for him to stroll past the groups of watchful girls, blowing a flute made of an eagle's wing bone, as the flirtatious young bucks did.
More examples (3)
But this buck claimed he was a big war chief with the Nawyecky Comanches.
She got so she’d rather have a buck nigger than me!
Her curly red hair loose from its combs hangin' down her back and her freckled skin bare, and a big ole nigger buck was doin' things to her! He'd always known that Hootch Carter raped and killed Becky Nell, never had reason to doubt it.
An Aboriginal man.
Usage- Australia
- Derogatory
- Obsolete
- Examples
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‘A couple of Old Men wanted that young lubra and they’ve spurred on the bucks to chase Possum and cut his liver out.’
Lowest rank; a private.
Usage- US usage
- Slang
A unit of a particular currency A dollar (one hundred cents).
Usage- Australia
- Canada
- New-Zealand
- US usage
- Informal
- Examples
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Can I borrow five bucks?
Won't yer give Jake ten bucks ter buy hisself some close, so he look nice 'mong de gemmens?
A unit of a particular currency A rand (currency unit).
Usage- South-Africa
- Informal
A unit of a particular currency A sixpence.
Usage- UK usage
- Obsolete
- Slang
- Examples
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three and a buck
A unit of a particular currency A euro.
Usage- Informal
- Rare
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Those fools are all probably sitting outside the pork store, recalling the incident about losing a thousand bucks with the fake Gajas, and chewing on their soggy stogies.
A unit of a particular currency Money.
Usage- Australia
- South-Africa
- US usage
- broadly
- Informal
- Examples
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Corporations will do anything to make a buck.
It's all about bucks, kid. The rest is conversation.
A unit of a particular currency One million dollars.
One hundred.
Usage- US usage
- Slang
- Synonyms
- Examples
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The police caught me driving a buck forty [140 miles per hour] on the freeway.
That skinny guy? C’mon, he can’t weigh more than a buck and a quarter [125 pounds].
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. The body of a post mill, particularly in East Anglia. See Wikipedia:Windmill machinery.
Usage- UK usage
- dialectal
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. A frame on which firewood is sawed; a sawhorse; a sawbuck.
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. A leather-covered frame used for gymnastic vaulting.
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. A wood or metal frame used by automotive customizers and restorers to assist in the shaping of sheet metal bodywork.
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Plans in hand, Frank first paid his friend Raniero a visit, and the artisan quickly went to work on a fortified wood buck that would serve as a form for the Griffith 600 Series, as the car was formally known and marketed by Griffith Motors.
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. An object of various types, placed on a table to indicate turn or status; such as a brass object, placed in rotation on a US Navy wardroom dining table to indicate which officer is to be served first, or an item passed around a poker table indicating the dealer or placed in the pot to remind the winner of some privilege or obligation when his or her turn to deal next comes.
Usage- Dated
An implement the body of which is likened to a male sheep’s body due maintaining a stiff-legged position as if by stubbornness. An object of various types, placed on a table to indicate turn or status; such as a brass object, placed in rotation on a US Navy wardroom dining table to indicate which officer is to be served first, or an item passed around a poker table indicating the dealer or placed in the pot to remind the winner of some privilege or obligation when his or her turn to deal next comes. Blame; responsibility; scapegoating; finger-pointing.
Usage- broadly
- Dated
- in certain metaphors or phrases
- in the US
- Examples
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pass the buck
the buck stops here
Synonym of buck dance.
Usage- Dated
Synonym of mule (“type of cocktail with ginger ale etc.”).
A kind of large marble in children's games.
Usage- Dated
- Slang
An unlicensed cabman.
Usage- UK usage
- Obsolete
- Slang
Verb
To copulate, as bucks and does.
Usage- Intransitive
Verb
To bend; buckle.
Usage- Intransitive
To leap upward arching its back, coming down with head low and forelegs stiff, forcefully kicking its hind legs upward, often in an attempt to dislodge or throw a rider or pack.
Usage- Intransitive
- of a horse or similar saddle or pack animal
- Examples
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More examples (1)
1849, Jackey Jackey, The Statement of the Aboriginal Native Jackey Jackey, who Accompanied Mr. Kennedy, William Carron, Narrative of an Expedition Undertaken Under the Direction of the Late Mr. Assistant Surveyor E. B. Kennedy, 2004 Gutenberg Australia eBook #0201121, At the same time we got speared, the horses got speared too, and jumped and bucked all about, and got into the swamp.
To throw (a rider or pack) by bucking.
Usage- Transitive
- of a horse or similar saddle or pack animal
- Examples
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The brute that he was riding had nearly bucked him out of the saddle.
To resist obstinately; oppose or object strongly.
Usage- broadly
- Intransitive
- Examples
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The vice president bucked at the board’s latest solution.
To move or operate in a sharp, jerking, or uneven manner.
Usage- broadly
- Intransitive
- Examples
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The motor bucked and sputtered before dying completely.
To overcome or shed (e.g., an impediment or expectation), in pursuit of a goal; to force a way through despite (an obstacle); to resist or proceed against.
Usage- broadly
- Transitive
- Examples
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The plane bucked a strong headwind.
Our managers have to learn to buck the trend and do the right thing for their employees.
More examples (3)
John is really bucking the odds on that risky business venture. He's doing quite well.
I spoke to him in London recently and suggested he was bucking an age-old system. Surely popular performers studied the possible reactions of their audience in advance when deciding on a new approach?
1977-1980, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure [I] Asked if he wanted to go to a punk rock concert Saturday & he had another engagement but he would buck it because it sure sounded much more fun going with me.
To subject to a mode of punishment which consists of tying the wrists together, passing the arms over the bent knees, and putting a stick across the arms and in the angle formed by the knees.
Usage- Transitive
To strive or aspire e.g. to a promotion.
Usage- US usage
- Slang
To press a heavy, shaped bucking bar against the bucktail of a rivet, while the opposite end (the rivet factory head) is hammered by a rivet gun, to upset the bucktail into an appropriate shape, most commonly a pancake-shape.
To saw a felled tree into shorter lengths, as for firewood.
To output a voltage that is lower than the input voltage.
To fuck.
Usage- Ireland
- euphemistic
- Humorous
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Well he yoked the ass up to the cart. And then the holy ructions it did start. Well he bucked it in the air and he bucked it all around. Till he smashed the buckin' cart upon the ground.
Thatch had come down the stairs and chimed in: "Isn't he an awful buckin' eejit?"
More examples (1)
"Was he a buccaneer?" I asked. "No, eejit!" Lionel said. Never one to pass up a play on words, he continued, "He's a buckin' IRA man and he's gathering up an army in the Irish Free State. He says he's going to march up to Ulster and drive all of us Protestants into the Irish Sea!"
"I can see the headlines in the morning, taxi man bucking hangs himself.
More examples (2)
I will buck a French lad, Erin. I will buck a French lad, so help me God.
Protestors chanted "You're not wanted here" and held up placards with slogans such as "Buck off" - a pun on Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck's name - and "No to racist Ricketts".
To meet, to encounter, to come across.
Usage- Multicultural-London-English
- Examples
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If I buck a paigon, I will disappoint his mum
I go mad when I buck me a opper, chest and back and I fucked up his posture
Noun
The beech tree.
Usage- Scotland
- Examples
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There is in it also woodes of buck, and deir in them.
More examples (2)
But, whilst we thus condemn the timber, we must not omit to praise the mast, which fats our swine and deer, and hath, in some families, even supported men with bread. Chios endured a memorable siege by the beniefit of this mast. And, in some parts of France, they now grind the buck in mills; it affords a sweet oil, which the poor people east most willingly.
The HORNBEAM ( provincially “HORSE-BEECH," in contradistinction to “buck beech” — the true beech) is, in many woods, the most prevalent species; and being drawn up in thickets with a rapid growth, becomes tall and straight enough for hop poles: and is even suffered to grow up, as a species of wood timber.
The magnolia, buck [ beech?], and poplar never grow on lands subject to overflow.
More examples (1)
The underbrush is all there, spice brush, buck beech, iron wood and alder and no doubt in the spring of the year, there is a wealth of flowers.
Noun
Lye or suds in which cloth is soaked in the operation of bleaching, or in which clothes are washed.
Usage- Archaic
- Examples
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More examples (1)
1673, Robert Almond, The English Horseman and Complete Farrier, London: Simon Miller, Chapter 25 “Maunginess in the Main,” p. 236, […] when you find the scurf to fall off, wash the Neck and other parts with Buck Lye made blood warm.
The cloth or clothes soaked or washed.
Usage- Archaic
- Examples
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Buck! I would I could wash myself of the buck!
Verb
To soak, steep or boil in lye or suds, as part of the bleaching process.
Usage- Archaic
To wash (clothes) in lye or suds, or, in later usage, by beating them on stones in running water
Usage- Archaic
To break up or pulverize, as ores.
Usage- Archaic
- Examples
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More examples (1)
This [ore mixture] was bucked or cobbed down to a 'peasy' size (i.e. the size of a pea) or less, using a flat-bottomed bucking hammer, and then riddled into coarse peasy and finer (sand-sized) 'smitham' grades.
Noun
The body of a cart or waggon, especially the front part.
Usage- UK usage
- Archaic
- dialectal
Belly, breast, chest.
Usage- UK usage
- Archaic
- dialectal
Size.
Usage- UK usage
- Archaic
- dialectal
Verb
To swell out.
Usage- UK usage
- Archaic
- dialectal
- Intransitive
Verb
To boast or brag.
Usage- Archaic
- Intransitive
- Slang
- Related words
- Examples
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More examples (2)
And then […] he bucks with a quiet stubborn determination that would fill an American editor, or an Under Secretary of State with despair. He belongs to the 12-foot-tiger school, so perhaps he can't help it.
He was certainly bucking about his trophies, and for the sake of the argument you will be good enough to admit that you probably bucked about yours. What happens? You are overheard; you are followed; you are worked into the same scheme, and robbed on the same night.
Noun
a gymnastic horse without pommels and with one end elongated; used lengthwise for vaulting
- Synonyms
- Broader terms
a piece of paper money worth one dollar
a framework for holding wood that is being sawed
mature male of various mammals (especially deer or antelope)
- Broader terms
Verb
to strive with determination
- Examples
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John is bucking for a promotion
resist
- Synonyms
- Examples
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buck the trend
move quickly and violently
- Synonyms
- Broader terms
- Examples
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The car tore down the street
He came charging into my office
jump vertically, with legs stiff and back arched
- Broader terms
- Examples
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the young filly bucked