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waulk. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
waulk, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
waulk in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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English
Etymology
From Middle English walken, from Old English wealcian (“to roll up; muffle up”), from Proto-West Germanic *walkōn, from Proto-Germanic *walkōną (“to roll about; full (cloth)”).
Cognate with Scots waulk (“to full”), Dutch walken (“to full”), German walken (“to full”), Danish valke (“to full”), Swedish valka (“to full”). Doublet of walk.
Verb
waulk (third-person singular simple present waulks, present participle waulking, simple past and past participle waulked)
- (transitive, obsolete outside Northern England and Scotland) to make cloth (especially tweed in Scotland) denser and more felt-like by soaking and beating.
- 1992, Diana Gabaldon, Dragonfly in Amber, Random House Group (Arrow Books), page 590,
- I hid a smile at the mention of wool waulking. Alone among the Highland farms, I was sure, the women of Lailybroch waulked their wool not only to the old traditional chants but also to the rhythms of Moliére and Piron.
2013, Marek Korczynski, Michael Pickering, Emma Robertson, Rhythms of Labour: Music at Work in Britain, Cambridge University Press, page 97:Here, we compare waulking songs and shanties to see how they operated in bringing women and men, respectively, into a sense of close alignment.
Synonyms
- (make denser and more like felt by soaking and beating): full, walk
Translations
Scots
Etymology
From Middle English walken, from Old English wealcan (“to roll, toss”).
Pronunciation
Verb
waulk (third-person singular simple present waulks, present participle waulkin, simple past waulkit, past participle waulkit)
- (transitive) to full (cloth)
- (intransitive) (of cloth) to shrink from moisture