rack
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɹæk/
rhymes: -æk
homophone: wrack
Forms: form: racks
form: racking
form: racked
form: racked
form: no-table-tags
form: glossary
form: rack
form: rack
form: racked
form: rack
form: rackest
form: racked
form: rackedst
form: racks
form: racketh
form: racked
form: rack
form: racked
form: rack
form: racked
form: rack
form: -
form: racking
form: racked
Etymology: From Old English reċċan (“to stretch out, extend”).
Senses: glosses: To place in or hang on a rack.
examples: text: He was racked and miserably tormented.
ref: 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC:
text: As the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt later recalled, his father, Henry VII's jewel-house keeper Henry Wyatt, had been racked on the orders of Richard III, who had sat there and watched.
ref: 2011, Thomas Penn, Winter King, Penguin, published 2012, page 228:
glosses: To torture (someone) on the rack.
examples: text: Vaunting aloud but racked with deep despair.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
synonyms: word: torment
word: torture
word: ache
word: afflict
word: aggrieve
word: agonize
word: anguish
word: dere
word: excruciate
word: hurt
word: irritate
word: pang
word: pine
word: rack
word: throe
word: torment
word: torture
word: wring
glosses: To cause (someone) to suffer pain.
examples: text: Try what my credit can in Venice do; / That shall be racked even to the uttermost.
ref: c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
text: The landlords there most shamefully rack their tenants.
ref: 1596 (date written; published 1633), Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande […], Dublin: […] Societie of Stationers, […], →OCLC; republished as A View of the State of Ireland […] (Ancient Irish Histories), Dublin: […] Society of Stationers, […] Hibernia Press, […] [b]y John Morrison, 1809, →OCLC:
text: Grant that I may never rack a Scripture Similie, beyond the true intent thereof.
ref: 1645, Thomas Fuller, “Scripture Observations”, in Good Thoughts in Bad Times, […], Exeter, Devon: […] Thomas Hunt, →OCLC, section I, page 69:
glosses: To stretch or strain; to harass, or oppress by extortion.
examples: text: Foꝛ when we heare one racke the name of God,/Abiure the ſcriptures, and his Sauiour Chꝛiſt...
ref: 1589–1592 (date written), Ch[ristopher] Marl[owe], The Tragicall History of D. Faustus. […], London: […] V[alentine] S[immes] for Thomas Bushell, published 1604, →OCLC, signature B2, recto:
topics: human-sciences
mysticism
occult
philosophy
sciences
glosses: To alternately concatenate two words to magical effect.
topics: ball-games
billiards
games
hobbies
lifestyle
pool
snooker
sports
synonyms: rack up
glosses: To put the balls into the triangular rack and set them in place on the table.
examples: text: Bike7125 raises a great point suggesting that cups could have been recommended "optional" equipment in school PE. I never got racked by a baseball or softball, but we did have a gym teacher, who insisted on a weekly session of a "cruelty sport" called bombardment. The idea was to throw basketballs at a line of guys, and try to hit them. (Guess where most gym bullys aimed!)
ref: 1999 November 2, Squad Leader, “CUPS Required for Gym Class?”, in alt.support.jock-strap (Usenet):
glosses: To strike in the testicles.
examples: text: He racked three boxes of gum!
text: my buddy used to go racking for spray paint at the home despot. then a banger shot him in the head one night.^([sic])
ref: 2007 May 4, streetwords, Urban Dictionary:
glosses: To shoplift (especially in a megastore), often by taking off of a rack.
synonyms: steal
glosses: To take that which belongs to another, without regard of right or permission.
topics: engineering
firearms
government
military
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
politics
tools
war
weaponry
glosses: To (manually) load (a round of ammunition) from the magazine or belt into firing position in an automatic or semiautomatic firearm.
topics: engineering
firearms
government
military
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
politics
tools
war
weaponry
glosses: To move the slide bar on a shotgun in order to chamber the next round.
topics: business
mining
glosses: To wash (metals, ore, etc.) on a rack.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: To bind together, as two ropes, with cross turns of yarn, marline, etc.
examples: text: Post-and-lintel construction racks easily.
text: The racking strength of a wall system is defined in terms of its ability to resist horizon­tal inplane shear forces. The shear, or racking, forces which act on wail systems arise primarily from wind.
ref: 1977, Roger L. Tuomi, David S. Gromala, “Racking Strength of Walls”, in USDA Forest Service Research Paper, number FPL 301:
synonyms: shear
qualifier: structural engineering
glosses: To tend to shear a structure (that is, force it to bend, lean, or move in different directions at different points).
Derived terms: nerve-racking
pain-racked
rack off
rack one's brain
rack one's brains
tap, rack, bang
tap, rack, go