shark
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ʃɑːk/
ipa: /ʃɑɹk/
homophone: shock (non-rhotic, father-bother merger)
rhymes: -ɑː(ɹ)k
Forms: form: sharks
form: sharke
Etymology: From Middle English shark (used by Thomas Beckington in 1442 to refer to a kind of fish), of uncertain origin. Most likely from a semantic extension of the German-derived shark (“scoundrel”), see below. The fish was originally called a dogfish or haye in English and Middle English.
alternative theories
Some older dictionaries derived the word from Latin c(h)archarias, c(h)acharus (from Ancient Greek), but admit that "the requisite [Old French] forms intermediate between E. shark and L. carcharus are not found, and it is not certain that the name [shark] was orig. applied to the fish; it may have been first used of a greedy man".
Other older authorities speculated that the word might derive from Yucatec Maya xok (“fish”) (/ʃok/), as John Hawkins brought a specimen from the area where Mayan was spoken to England in the 1560s. However, the 1442 use rules out a New World origin for the word.
Senses: examples: text: The straunge fishe is in length xvij. foote and iij. foote broad, and in compas about the bodie vj. foote; and is round snowted, short headdid, hauing iij. rankes of teeth on either iawe, …. Also it hath v. gills of eache side of the head, shoing white. Ther is no proper name for it that I know, but that sertayne men of Captayne Haukinses doth call it a sharke.
ref: 1569, The true discripcion of this marueilous straunge Fishe, whiche was taken on Thursday was sennight, the xvi. day of June, this present month, in the yeare of our Lord God, M.D.lxix., a broadside printed in London, the second earliest known use of the term; reprinted in A Collection of Seventy-Nine Black-Letter Ballads and Broadsides: printed in the reigh of Queen Elizabeth, between the years 1559 and 1597 in 1867
text: He said he had spoken to a woman who was kayaking off Catalina Island, California, in 2008 when a shark slammed her kayak from underneath and sent her flying into the air. She then landed on the back of the shark, Collier said. "At that point the shark started to swim out to sea, so she jumped off its back," Collier said.
ref: 2011 October 13, AP, “Man 'surfs' great white shark”, in The Guardian:
topics: biology
ichthyology
natural-sciences
zoology
glosses: Any predatory fish of the superorder Selachimorpha, with a cartilaginous skeleton and 5 to 7 gill slits on each side of its head.
glosses: Flesh of this animal, consumed as food.
examples: text: Cladoselache, a well-preserved Devonian shark fossil from Ohio. Here the cartilages and some muscle tissues are preserved intact
ref: 2024, John Long, The Secret History of Sharks: The Rise of the Ocean's Most Fearsome Predators, New York: Ballantine Books, page 17:
topics: biology
history
human-sciences
natural-sciences
paleontology
sciences
glosses: Any fish of the class Chondrichthyes, especially an extinct shark-like holocephalian.
glosses: A freshwater fish that resembles a true shark (Selachimorpha) in appearance or movement; a freshwater shark.
Any fish in the genus Epalzeorhynchos.
glosses: A freshwater fish that resembles a true shark (Selachimorpha) in appearance or movement; a freshwater shark.
Any fish in the genus Balantiocheilos.
glosses: A freshwater fish that resembles a true shark (Selachimorpha) in appearance or movement; a freshwater shark.
An iridescent shark (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus).
glosses: A freshwater fish that resembles a true shark (Selachimorpha) in appearance or movement; a freshwater shark.
A roseline shark (Dawkinsia denisonii).
glosses: A freshwater fish that resembles a true shark (Selachimorpha) in appearance or movement; a freshwater shark.
A paroon shark (Pangasius sanitwongsei).
glosses: A noctuid moth of species Cucullia umbratica.
qualifier: university slang
glosses: A university student who is not a fresher that has engaged in sexual activity with a fresher; usually habitually and with multiple people.
Synonyms: sense: scaleless cartilaginous fish
word: haye
Derived terms: angel shark
angelshark
Atlantic sharpnose shark
bala shark
bamboo shark
basking shark
blacktip reef shark
blind shark
blue shark
bonnethead shark
bramble shark
broadfin shark
brown shark
bullhead shark
bull shark
card shark
cardshark
carpet shark
carpetshark
catshark
cat shark
collared carpet shark
cookiecutter shark
copper shark
cow shark
crocodile shark
deepwater shark
dogfish shark
dusky shark
eagle shark
epaulette shark
fox shark
freshwater shark
frilled shark
frill shark
Ganges shark
ghost shark
goblin shark
gray reef shark
great mackerel shark
great white shark
Greenland shark
grey nurse shark
grey reef shark
ground shark
gulper shark
gummyshark
gummy shark
hammerhead shark
horn shark
hound shark
houndshark
iridescent shark
jump the shark
kitefin shark
land shark
lantern shark
lanternshark
lemon shark
leopard shark
loan shark
lost shark
mackerel shark
mako shark
megamouth shark
megatooth shark
mud shark
narrowtooth shark
nurse shark
oceanic whitetip shark
prickly shark
pyjama shark
rainbow shark
red-finned shark
red-fin shark
redfin shark
red-tailed black shark
red tailed shark
redtail shark
reef shark
requiem shark
river shark
rough shark
ruby shark
salmon shark
sandbar shark
sand shark
sand tiger shark
saw shark
sawshark
school shark
shark attack
shark bait
shark-bait
shark baiter
Shark Bay
shark bite
shark-bite
shark catfish
sharkdom
sharked
shark-finned
shark fin
shark-fin
shark fin soup
shark-gull
shark-infested
sharking
sharkish
sharkishly
shark-jumping
sharkless
sharklet
sharklike
sharkling
sharkmeat
shark net
shark ray
sharks and minnows
sharkskin
sharkskinned
sharksploitation
sharksucker
shark up
sharkwatching
shark week
sharky
sharpnose shark
sharptooth lemon shark
Siamese bala shark
sicklefin lemon shark
silver shark
sixgill shark
sleepershark
sleeper shark
slough shark
southern African frilled shark
spiny shark
striped catshark
swellshark
thickskin shark
thresher shark
tiger shark
tricolor shark
tricolour shark
walking shark
weasel shark
whaler shark
whale shark
whitecheek shark
whitefin shark
white shark
winghead shark
wouldn't shout if a shark bit him
zebra shark