Word: sack Part of Speech: verb Etymology: From Middle English sak, sek, sach, zech (“bag, sackcloth”), from Old English sacc (“sack, bag”) and sæċċ (“sackcloth, sacking”); both from Proto-West Germanic *sakku, from late Proto-Germanic *sakkuz (“sack”), borrowed from Latin saccus (“large bag”), from Ancient Greek σάκκος (sákkos, “bag of coarse cloth”), from Semitic, possibly Phoenician or Hebrew. Cognate with Dutch zak, German Sack, Swedish säck, Danish sæk, Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk sekk, Faroese and Icelandic sekkur, Hebrew שַׂק (śaq, “sack, sackcloth”), Aramaic סַקָּא, Classical Syriac ܣܩܐ, Ge'ez ሠቅ (śäḳ), Akkadian 𒆭𒊓 (saqqu), Egyptian sꜣgꜣ. Doublet of sac, saccus, saco, and sakkos. Černý and Forbes suggest the word was originally Egyptian, a nominal derivative of sꜣq (“to gather or put together”) that also yielded Coptic ⲥⲟⲕ (sok, “sackcloth”) and was borrowed into Greek perhaps by way of a Semitic intermediary. However, Vycichl and Hoch reject this idea, noting that such an originally Egyptian word would be expected to yield Hebrew *סַק rather than שַׂק. Instead, they posit that the Coptic and Greek words are both borrowed from Semitic, with the Coptic word perhaps developing via Egyptian sꜣgꜣ. Sense evolution * “Pillage” senses from the use of sacks in carrying off plunder. From Middle French sac, shortened from the phrase mettre à sac (“put it in a bag”), a military command to pillage; also parallel meaning with Italian sacco (“plunder”), from Medieval Latin saccō (“pillage”). From Vulgar Latin saccare (“to plunder”), from saccus (“sack”). See also ransack. American football “tackle” sense from this “plunder, conquer” root. * “Removal from employment” senses attested since 1825; the original formula was “to give (someone) the sack”, likely from the notion of a worker going off with his tools in a sack, or being given such a sack for his personal belongings as part of an expedient severance. Idiom exists earlier in French (on luy a donné son sac, 17c.) and Middle Dutch (iemand den zak geven). English verb in this sense recorded from 1841. Current verb, to sack (“to fire”) carries influence from the forceful nature of “plunder, tackle” verb senses. * Slang meaning “bunk, bed” is attested since 1825, originally nautical, likely in reference to sleeping bags. The verb meaning “go to bed” is recorded from 1946. * Slang meaning "scrotum" is an ellipsis of ballsack. Pronunciation: /sæk/, /sak/, /sɛk/ 1. To put in a sack or sacks. Example: Help me sack the groceries. Example: The gold was sacked in moose-hide bags, fifty pounds to the bag, and piled like so much firewood outside the spruce-bough lodge. 2. To bear or carry in a sack upon the back or the shoulders. 3. To plunder or pillage, especially after capture; to obtain spoils of war from. Example: The barbarians sacked Rome in 410 CE. Example: My sister wants to sack Tokyo. 4. To tackle the quarterback behind the line of scrimmage, especially before he is able to throw a pass. Example: On third down, the rejuvenated Rickey Jackson stormed in over All-Pro left tackle Richmond Webb to sack Marino yet again for a 2-yard loss. 5. To discharge from a job or position; to fire. Labels: informal, transitive Example: He was sacked last September. Example: […] Boris Berezovsky on Friday dismissed President Boris Yeltsin's move to sack him from his post as executive secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States, […] 6. To give up on, to abandon, delay, to not think about someone or something. Labels: Australia, slang, transitive Example: Sack the homework. Example: Sack him, let's run.