puck

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See also: Puck

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

From Middle English pouke, from Old English pūca (goblin, demon), from Proto-West Germanic *pūkō, from Proto-Germanic *pūkô (a goblin, spook), of uncertain origin.

Cognate with Old Norse púki (devil) (dialectal Swedish puke). Doublet of pooka.

Noun

puck (plural pucks)

  1. (now rare) A mischievous or hostile spirit.
    • 2017, Ronald Hutton, The Witch, Yale University Press, published 2018, page 232:
      William Tyndale allotted this character a role, of leading nocturnal travellers astray as the puck had been said to do since Anglo-Saxon times and the goblin since the later medieval period.
Synonyms
Derived terms

Etymology 2

From or influenced by Irish poc (stroke in hurling, bag). Compare poke (1861).

Verb

puck (third-person singular simple present pucks, present participle pucking, simple past and past participle pucked)

  1. (chiefly Ireland) To hit, strike.

Noun

puck (plural pucks)

  1. (ice hockey) A hard rubber disc; any other flat disc meant to be hit across a flat surface in a game.
    • 1886 February 28, Boston Daily Globe, page 2:
      In hockey a flat piece of rubber, say four inches long by three wide and about an inch thick, called a ‘puck’, is used.
    • 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 184:
      The game itself, though played by men, was probably meant to enact a mediation of the opposites of male and female, with a circular puck being the feminine symbol and the phallic hockey stick being the masculine symbol.
  2. (chiefly Canada) An object shaped like a puck.
    • 2004, Art Directors Annual, volume 83, Rotovision, page 142:
      He reaches into the urinal and picks up the puck. He then walk over to the sink and replaces a bar of soap with the urinal puck.
  3. (computing) A pointing device with a crosshair.
  4. (hurling, camogie) A penalty shot.
Derived terms
Descendants
  • Danish: puck
  • German: Puck
  • Swedish: puck
Translations
See also

Etymology 3

From the Irish poc (male adult goat, billy goat). Doublet of buck.

Noun

puck (plural pucks)

  1. (Ireland, rustic) billy goat

Etymology 4

Blend of pike +‎ tuck

Noun

puck (plural pucks)

  1. (trampoline, gymnastics) A body position between the pike and tuck positions, with knees slightly bent and folded in; open tuck.
    • 2013, The Sports Book: The Sports, the Rules, the Tactics, the Techniques:
      The puck position is allowed during competitions when performing multi-twisting multiple somersaults.

Swedish

Etymology

From English puck.

Noun

puck c

  1. (ice hockey) a puck
    Synonym: (colloquial) trissa

Declension

Declension of puck
nominative genitive
singular indefinite puck pucks
definite pucken puckens
plural indefinite puckar puckars
definite puckarna puckarnas

Idioms

All are colloquial.

References