bank

pronunciation

How to pronounce bank in British English: UK [bæŋk] word uk audio image

How to pronounce bank in American English: US [bæŋk] word us audio image

Noun:

a financial institution that accepts deposits and channels the money into lending activities
sloping land (especially the slope beside a body of water)
a supply or stock held in reserve for future use (especially in emergencies)
a building in which commercial banking is transacted
an arrangement of similar objects in a row or in tiers
a container (usually with a slot in the top) for keeping money at home
a long ridge or pile
the funds held by a gambling house or the dealer in some gambling games
a slope in the turn of a road or track; the outside is higher than the inside in order to reduce the effects of centrifugal force
a flight maneuver; aircraft tips laterally about its longitudinal axis (especially in turning)
Verb:

tip laterally
enclose with a bank
do business with a bank or keep an account at a bank
act as the banker in a game or in gambling
be in the banking business
put into a bank account
cover with ashes so to control the rate of burning
have confidence or faith in

Word Origin

bank: bank: [12] The various disparate meanings of modern English bank all come ultimately from the same source, Germanic *bangk-, but they have taken different routes to reach us. Earliest to arrive was ‘ridge, mound, bordering slope’, which came via a hypothetical Old Norse *banki. Then came ‘bench’ [13] (now obsolete except in the sense ‘series of rows or tiers’ – as in a typewriter’s bank of keys); this arrived from Old French banc, which was originally borrowed from Germanic *bangk- (also the source of English bench).Finally came ‘moneylender’s counter’ [15], whose source was either French banque or Italian banca – both in any case deriving ultimately once again from Germanic *bangk-. The current sense, ‘place where money is kept’, developed in the 17th century. The derived bankrupt [16] comes originally from Italian banca rotta, literally ‘broken counter’ (rotta is related to English bereave and rupture); in early times a broken counter or bench was symbolic of an insolvent moneylender.The diminutive of Old French banc was banquet ‘little bench’ (perhaps modelled on Italian banchetto), from which English gets banquet [15]. It has undergone a complete reversal in meaning over the centuries; originally it signified a ‘small snack eaten while seated on a bench (rather than at table)’.=> bench

bank (n.1): "financial institution," late 15c., from either Old Italian banca or Middle French banque (itself from the Italian word), both meaning "table" (the notion is of the moneylender's exchange table), from a Germanic source (compare Old High German bank "bench"); see bank (n.2). Bank holiday is from 1871, though the tradition is as old as the Bank of England. To cry all the way to the bank was coined 1956 by flamboyant pianist Liberace, after a Madison Square Garden concert that was packed with patrons but panned by critics.

bank (n.2): "earthen incline, edge of a river," c. 1200, probably in Old English but not attested in surviving documents, from a Scandinavian source such as Old Norse banki, Old Danish banke "sandbank," from Proto-Germanic *bangkon "slope," cognate with *bankiz "shelf" (see bench (n.)).

bank (v.): "to act as a banker," 1727, from bank (n.1). As "to deposit in a bank" from 1833. Figurative sense of "to rely on" (i.e. "to put money on") is from 1884, U.S. colloquial. Meaning "to ascend," as of an incline, is from 1892. In aeronautics, from 1911. Related: Banked; banking.