Word: prick Part of Speech: verb Etymology: From Middle English prikken, from Old English prician, priccan (“to prick”), from Proto-Germanic *prikōną, *prikjaną (“to pierce, prick”), of uncertain origin; perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *breyǵ- (“to scrape, scratch, rub, prickle, chap”). Cognate with dialectal English pritch, Dutch prikken (“to prick, sting”), Middle High German pfrecken (“to prick”), Swedish pricka (“to dot, prick”), and possibly to Lithuanian įbrėžti (“to scrape, scratch, carve, inscribe, strike”). Pronunciation: /pɹɪk/, [pʰɹ̠̊ɪk] 1. To pierce or puncture slightly. Labels: transitive Example: John hardly felt the needle prick his arm when the adept nurse drew blood. 2. To pierce or puncture slightly. Labels: transitive 3. To pierce or puncture slightly. Labels: transitive Example: They had shot at old Tom, the hare, too, but he is still alive; at least I pricked him yesterday morn across the path into the turnip field. 4. To form by piercing or puncturing. Labels: transitive Example: to prick holes in paper Example: to prick a pattern for embroidery 5. To mark or denote by a puncture; to designate by pricking; to choose; to mark. Labels: obsolete Example: c. 1620, Francis Bacon, letter of advice to Sir George Villiers Some who are pricked for sheriffs. Example: And, hark ye—let the soldiers for duty be carefully pricked off; and see that none of them be more or less partakers of your debauch. 6. To mark the surface of (something) with pricks or dots; especially, to trace a ship’s course on (a chart). Labels: transitive 7. To run a middle seam through the cloth of a sail. Labels: obsolete 8. To fix by the point; to attach or hang by puncturing. Example: The cooks [...]prick it [a slice] on a prog of iron. Example: I caused the edges of two knives to be ground truly strait; and pricking their points into a board, so that their edges might look towards one another, and, meeting near their points, contain a rectilinear angle 9. To be punctured; to suffer or feel a sharp pain, as by puncture. Labels: dated, intransitive Example: A sore finger pricks. Example: By the pricking of my thumbs, / Something wicked this way comes. 10. To make or become sharp; to erect into a point; to raise, as something pointed; said especially of the ears of an animal, such as a horse or dog; and usually followed by up. Labels: ambitransitive Example: The dog's ears pricked up at the sound of a whistle. Example: The courser [...] pricks up his ears. 11. Usually in the form prick out: to plant (seeds or seedlings) in holes made in soil at regular intervals. Example: Seed should be sown thinly and evenly to enable seedlings to be pricked out without disturbing those that have just emerged. If there is space, seedlings should be pricked out individually, either into small pots or module trays. Example: All three germinate well in pots and can be pricked out and potted on with no problems. [...] Grass seeds can be collected as the heads begin to break up. Sow them in late spring, prick out small bundles of seedlings into 7.5cm (3in) pots and transplant them in late May. 12. To incite, stimulate, goad. Labels: transitive Example: My duty pricks me on to utter that. 13. To urge one's horse on; to ride quickly. Labels: archaic, intransitive Example: At last, as through an open plaine they yode, They spide a knight that towards them pricked fayre [...]. Example: Part, on the plain or in the air sublime, / Upon the wing or in swift race contend, / As at the Olympian games or Pythian fields; / Part curb their fiery steed, or shun the goal / With rapid wheel, or fronted brigads form : / As when, to warn proud cities, war appears / Waged in the trouble sky, and armies rush / To battle in the clouds; before each van / Prick forth the aery knights, and couch their spears / Till thickest legions close; with feats of arms / From either end of heaven the welkin burns. 14. To affect with sharp pain; to sting, as with remorse. Example: Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart. Example: […] I was prick'd with some reproof, / As one that let foul wrong stagnate and be, / By having look'd too much thro' alien eyes, / And wrought too long with delegated hands, / Not used mine own: […] 15. To make acidic or pungent. Labels: transitive Example: For then their late Attracts decline, And turn as eager as prick'd Wine 16. To become sharp or acid; to turn sour, as wine. Labels: intransitive 17. To aim at a point or mark. Example: This prayse belongeth to stronge shootinge and drawinge of mightye bowes, not to prickinge, and nere shootinge. Example: With Broad-arrow, or But, or Prick, or Rouing Shaft, At Markes full fortie score, they vs'd to Prick, and Roue. 18. to dress or adorn; to prink. Labels: obsolete, usually