# bike
## English
### Pronunciation

* IPA: /baɪk/
* (US, Canada) IPA: [bɐɪk]
** Audio (US):(file)
* Rhymes: -aɪk

### Etymology 1

From bicycle, by shortening, and possibly alteration. Attested from 1882.
One explanation for the pronunciation is that bicycle is parsed to bi(cy)c(le). An alternative explanation is that bicycle is shortened to bic(ycle), and the terminal [s] is converted to a [k] because there is an underlying underspecified [k]/[s] sound, which is softened to [s] in bicycle but retained as [k] in bike; compare the letter ‘c’ (used for [k]/[s]).

#### Noun

bike (plural bikes)
* Clipping of bicycle.
** 2017, Chiz Dakin, Cycling in the Peak District […] , Cicerone Press Limited, →ISBN:It's called a gravel bike, and seems to combine the advantages of both road and mountain bikes – with a similar ability to lap up the miles on tarmac as a road bike, while still being very capable off-road.
* Clipping of motorbike.
* Any vehicle sharing some characteristics with a bicycle or motorbike, such as pedal power, a handlebar, or a saddle.
** 2017 July 17, Nell's Tavern, Larry Brasington, page 50:He warmed up the engine; the bike hovered off the ground despite his weight and the extra equipment.
** 2021 May 18, Michael Hearst, Unconventional Vehicles: Forty-Five of the Strangest Cars, Trains, Planes, Submersibles, Dirigibles, and Rockets EVER, Chronicle Books, →ISBN, page 17:In 2017, Amsterdam banned beer bikes from the center of the Dutch city. About 6,000 locals signed a petition, calling on the council to outlaw the vehicles, referring to them as a “terrible phenomenon.”
* (slang, derogatory) Ellipsis of village bike.
    Synonyms: slapper, slag

##### Hyponyms

* cargo bike
* cross bike
* dirt bike
* electric bike
* fat bike, fatbike
* fire bike
* mountain bike
* pit bike
* pushbike
* racing bike
* road bike
* street bike
* track bike
* utility bike

##### Derived terms

* antibike
* aquabike
* aqua bike
* balance bike
* bar bike
* beer bike
* bikable
* bike-and-ride
* bikeathon
* bike box
* bike cab
* bikefishing
* bike jockey strap
* bike lane
* bikelash
* bike-lash
* bikeless
* bike lift
* bikelike
* bikelock
* bike lock
* bikemaker
* bike motocross
* bikepacker
* bikepacking
* bike path
* bikeporn
* bike pump
* biker
* bike rack
* bike ride
* bikeroad
* bikery
* bikeshare
* bikeshed
* bike shed
* bike-shedding
* bike stand
* bike staple
* bike station
* biketard
* bike taxi
* bikeway
* bikewear
* bikie, bikey (Australia)
* BMX bike
* Boris bike
* box bike
* Christ on a bike
* dirtbike
* e-bike
* exercise bike
* ghost bike
* gravel bike
* hand bike
* handbike
* hoverbike
* hyperbike
* lady's bike
* like riding a bike
* litrebike
* minibike
* monkey bike
* musclebike
* off-road bike
* on yer bike
* on your bike
* outbike
* party bike
* pocket bike
* push-bike
* push bike
* quad bike
* racebike
* railbike
* rat bike
* skibike
* skybike
* snow bike
* spinning bike
* sport bike
* sportbike
* stationary bike
* superbike
* town bike
* trail bike
* village bike
* water bike
* waterbike

##### Descendants

* → Italian: bike f
* → Norman: bike f

##### See also

* trike

#### Verb

bike (third-person singular simple present bikes, present participle biking, simple past and past participle biked)
* (intransitive) To ride a bike.
    I biked so much yesterday that I'm very sore today.
** 1975 April 17, Jack Weatherly, “Dallas or Bust”, in The Courier News, volume 80, number 286, Blytheville, Ark., page 8, column 3:In the 1890’s “women were behind the stove,” he relates. But they cycled, too. “And they had difficulty pedalling bicycles with ankle-length skirts. “At the time,” Taylor said, “the most sinful thing a woman could do was to show light between her legs. “The original culotte was designed by a LAW member’s wife. The churches (in the East) termed this bepantsed female activity of biking “sinful bicycling,” he noted.
* (intransitive) To travel by bike.
    It was such a nice day I decided to bike to the store, though it's far enough I usually take my car.
** 2017, Gucci Mane, Neil Martinez-Belkin, The Autobiography of Gucci Mane, page 32:He saw me catch a trap and leave the house of a drug dealer. That's why he targeted me. He could have easily blown my ass off right then and there for lying, but for some reason he didn't. He just left. I biked back to my plug's spot and told him […]
* (transitive) To transport by bicycle.
    I biked them the letters.
** 2020 September 1, Tom Lamont, “The butcher's shop that lasted 300 years (give or take)”, in The Guardian‎:Frank, a teenager, arrived at his grandfather’s shop to begin work as a butcher’s boy. The job would be to bike parcels of meat around Dronfield and the surrounding countryside between the cities of Sheffield and Chesterfield, right on the county border of Derbyshire and Yorkshire.

##### Descendants

* → French: biker (verb)

##### Translations

    The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

#### References

* ↑ An Etymological Brainteaser: The Shortening of Bicycle to Bike, Robert B. Hausmann, American Speech, Vol. 51, No. 3/4 (Autumn - Winter, 1976), pp. 272–274

#### Further reading

* bike on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

### Etymology 2

From Middle English bike, byke (“a nest of wild bees or wasps; also, honeycomb”), of unknown origin. Perhaps a back-formation of Middle English *bykere (“beekeeper”), from Old English bēocere (“beekeeper”); or from Old English *bȳc, a byform of Old English būc (“belly; vessel; container”). Compare also Scots byke (“beehive, anthill; home, dwelling”), Old Norse bý (“bee”).

#### Alternative forms

* byke

#### Noun

bike (plural bikes)
* (Scotland, Northern England) A hive of bees, or a nest of wasps, hornets, or ants.
** 1818 July 25, Jedadiah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC:like blue bottle flees in a blink of sunshine, […] A bonny bike there’s o’ them!
** 1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 107:he stood for a minute talking to them about their job of gathering cones, and telling them a story about a tree he’d once climbed which had a wasp’s byke in it unbeknown to him.
* (chiefly Scotland, by extension, collective) A crowd of people.

### Anagrams

* Beki, kibe

## Basque
### Etymology

From Latin pix.

### Noun

bike inan
* pitch

## Farefare
### Pronunciation

IPA: /bí.ké/

### Verb

bike
* shake, move
    Mam yetɩ m yõkɛ la foote, zɛ sĩm da bike
       I'm going to take a photo, keep still, and do not move

## French
### Verb

bike
* inflection of biker:
** first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
** second-person singular imperative

## Italian
### Etymology

Borrowed from English bike.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /ˈbajk/
* Rhymes: -ajk

### Noun

bike f (invariable)
* motorbike, motorcycle

## Norman
### Etymology

Borrowed from English bike.

### Noun

bike f (plural bikes)
* (Jersey) bicycle

#### Derived terms

* bike à cartchaîson (“cargo bike”)
* bike à deux (“tandem”)
* bike à montangne (“mountain bike”)
* c'mîn à bike, sente à bike (“bike path”)
* par à bikes (“bike rack”)

## Northern Kurdish
### Verb

bike
* third-person singular future of kirin

## Portuguese
### Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English bike.

### Pronunciation

* (Brazil) IPA: /ˈbaj.ki/ [ˈbaɪ̯.ki]
* (Brazil) IPA: /ˈbaj.ki/ [ˈbaɪ̯.ki]
** (Southern Brazil) IPA: /ˈbaj.ke/ [ˈbaɪ̯.ke]

### Noun

bike f (plural bikes)
* (Brazil, slang) bike (bicycle)
    Synonym: bicicleta

## Slovene
### Noun

bike
* accusative plural of bik