cheek
pronunciation
How to pronounce cheek in British English:
UK [tʃiːk]
How to pronounce cheek in American English:
US [tʃiːk]
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- Noun:
- either side of the face below the eyes
- an impudent statement
- either of the two large fleshy masses of muscular tissue that form the human rump
- impudent aggressiveness
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- Verb:
- speak impudently to
Word Origin
- cheek
- cheek: [OE] Old English cēace and cēoce go back respectively to prehistoric West Germanic *kǣkōn and *keukōn, but beyond that the word has no known relatives in other Indo-European languages. It has, however, produced one or two interesting offshoots. It forms the basis of the verb choke, and may be the source of chock-full (literally, ‘full up to the cheeks’); and Middle Dutch kākelen, source of English cackle [13], may be partly based on the related Middle Dutch kāke ‘jaw’. The metaphorical sense ‘impudence’ (whence cheeky) arose in the 19th century, originally as ‘insolent talk’.=> cackle, chock-full, choke
- cheek (n.)
- Old English ceace, cece "jaw, jawbone," in late Old English also "the fleshy wall of the mouth." Perhaps from the root of Old English ceowan "chew" (see chew (v.)), or from Proto-Germanic *kaukon (cognates: Middle Low German kake "jaw, jawbone," Middle Dutch kake "jaw," Dutch kaak), not found outside West Germanic. Words for "cheek," "jaw," and "chin" tend to run together in IE languages (compare PIE *genw-, source of Greek genus "jaw, cheek," geneion "chin," and English chin); Aristotle considered the chin as the front of the "jaws" and the cheeks as the back of them. The other Old English word for "cheek" was ceafl (see jowl). A thousand men he [Samson] slow eek with his hond, And had no wepen but an asses cheek. [Chaucer, "Monk's Tale"] In reference to the buttocks from c. 1600. Sense of "insolence" is from 1840, perhaps from a notion akin to that which led to jaw "insolent speech," mouth off, etc. To turn the other cheek is an allusion to Matt. v:39 and Luke vi:29.
Example
- 1. Don 't mind the gravel digging into your cheek .
- 2. A hot tear ran down his cheek .
- 3. Rosie gave her an affectionate kiss on each cheek .
- 4. It 's not that you prefer not to disclose , it is that you think it a darn cheek that they asked you in the first place .
- 5. If you start to notice that you 're breaking out ( especially in the cheek area ) , it may be time to clean your brushes .