rook

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See also: Rook and röök

English

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

A rook (bird)

Noun

rook (countable and uncountable, plural rooks)

  1. A European bird, Corvus frugilegus, of the crow family.
    • 1768, Thomas Pennant, British Zoology, page 168:
      But what distinguishes the rook from the crow is the bill; the nostrils, chin, and sides of that and the mouth being in old birds white and bared of feathers, by often thrusting the bill into the ground in search of the erucæ of the Dor-beetle*; the rook then, instead of being proscribed, should be treated as the farmer's friend; as it clears his ground from caterpillars, that do incredible damage by eating the roots of the corn.
    • 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, , →OCLC, Canto XV, page 24:
      To-night the winds begin to rise
      ⁠And roar from yonder dropping day:
      ⁠The last red leaf is whirl’d away,
      The rooks are blown about the skies; […]
  2. A cheat or swindler; someone who betrays.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:deceiver, Thesaurus:fraudster
    • 7 April 1705, William Wycherley, Letter to Alexander Pope in The Works of Alexander Pope 36:
      So I am (like an old rook, who is ruined by gaming) forced to live on the good fortune of the pushing young men, whose fancies are so vigorous that they ensure their success in their adventures with Muses, by their strength and imagination.
  3. A bad deal; a rip-off.
  4. (British) A type of firecracker used by farmers to scare birds of the same name.
  5. (uncountable) A trick-taking game, usually played with a specialized deck of cards.
    • 2007, Malcolm Bull, Keith Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary: Seventh-day Adventism and the American Dream, page 174:
      Adventists still do not really know how to play cards, apart from the sanitized version of bridge, Rook.
  6. (slang, archaic) A parson.
Derived terms
Translations

See also

Verb

rook (third-person singular simple present rooks, present participle rooking, simple past and past participle rooked)

  1. (transitive) To cheat or swindle.
    • 1974, GB Edwards, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, New York, published 2007, page 311:
      Some had spent a week in Jersey before coming to Guernsey; and, from what Paddy had heard, they really do know how to rook the visitors over there.
Synonyms
Hyponyms
  • (cheat): Greek (at cards)
Translations

Etymology 2

A rook (chess)

Inherited from Middle English rook, rooke, roke, rok, from Old French roc, ultimately from Persian رخ (rox), from Middle Persian lhw' (rox, rook, castle (chess)). Compare roc.

Noun

rook (plural rooks)

  1. (chess) A piece shaped like a castle tower, that can be moved only up, down, left or right (but not diagonally) or in castling.
  2. (rare) A castle or other fortification.
Synonyms
Derived terms
Translations
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

See also

Chess pieces in English · chess pieces, chessmen (see also: chess) (layout · text)
♚ ♛ ♜ ♝ ♞ ♟
king queen rook, castle bishop knight pawn

Etymology 3

From rookie.

Noun

rook (plural rooks)

  1. (baseball, slang) A rookie.

Etymology 4

Inherited from Middle English roke, rock, rok (mist; vapour; drizzle; smoke; fumes), from Old Norse *rauk, related to Icelandic rok, roka (whirlwind; seafoam; seaspray), Middle Dutch rooc, rok, Modern Dutch rook (smoke; fog).

Noun

rook (uncountable)

  1. mist; fog; roke

Etymology 5

Verb

rook (third-person singular simple present rooks, present participle rooking, simple past and past participle rooked)

  1. (obsolete) To squat; to ruck.

Etymology 6

Verb

rook (third-person singular simple present rooks, present participle rooking, simple past and past participle rooked)

  1. Pronunciation spelling of look. (mimicking Asian speech)

References

  1. ^ Rook” in John Walker, A Critical Pronouncing Dictionary , London: Sold by G. G. J. and J. Robinſon, Paternoſter Row; and T. Cadell, in the Strand, 1791, →OCLC, page 439, column 3.

Anagrams

Afrikaans

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

Inherited from Dutch rook (smoke), from Middle Dutch rôoc, from Old Dutch *rōk, from Proto-Germanic *raukiz.

Noun

rook (uncountable)

  1. smoke
Derived terms

Etymology 2

Inherited from Dutch roken (to smoke).

Verb

rook (present rook, present participle rokende, past participle gerook)

  1. (intransitive, transitive) to smoke (a tobacco product or surrogate)

Dutch

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle Dutch rôoc, from Old Dutch *rōk, from Proto-Germanic *raukiz.

Noun

rook m (uncountable)

  1. smoke
Derived terms
Descendants
  • Afrikaans: rook
  • Negerhollands: rook

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

rook

  1. inflection of roken:
    1. first-person singular present indicative
    2. (in case of inversion) second-person singular present indicative
    3. imperative

Verb

rook

  1. singular past indicative of ruiken
  2. singular past indicative of rieken

Anagrams