wick
pronunciation
How to pronounce wick in British English:
UK [wɪk]
How to pronounce wick in American English:
US [wɪk]
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- Noun:
- any piece of cord that conveys liquid by capillary action
- a loosely woven cord (in a candle or oil lamp) that draws fuel by capillary action up into the flame
Word Origin
- wick
- wick: [OE] Wick ‘burning fibre in a candle or lamp’ has West Germanic relatives in German wieche and Dutch wiek, but its ultimate ancestry is uncertain (a connection has been suggested with Old Irish figim ‘I weave’). The wick of get on someone’s wick ‘annoy someone’, incidentally (first recorded in 1945), is probably a different word. It appears to be short for Hampton Wick, rhyming slang for ‘prick, penis’ (Hampton Wick is a district in southwest London; its wick means historically ‘village, town’, and is the same word ultimately as the -wich, -wick of English place-names).
- wick (n.1)
- "bundle of fiber in a lamp or candle," 17c. spelling alteration of wueke, from Old English weoce "wick of a lamp or candle," from West Germanic *weukon (cognates: Middle Dutch wieke, Dutch wiek, Old High German wiohha, German Wieche), of unknown origin, with no known cognates beyond Germanic. To dip one's wick "engage in sexual intercourse" (in reference to males) is recorded from 1958, perhaps from Hampton Wick, rhyming slang for "prick," which would connect it rather to wick (n.2).
- wick (n.2)
- "dairy farm," now surviving, if at all, as a localism in East Anglia or Essex, it was once the common Old English wic "dwelling place, lodging, house, mansion, abode," then coming to mean "village, hamlet, town," and later "dairy farm" (as in Gatwick "Goat-farm"). Common in this latter sense 13c.-14c. The word is from a general Germanic borrowing from Latin vicus "group of dwellings, village; a block of houses, a street, a group of streets forming an administrative unit" (see vicinity). Compare Old High German wih "village," German Weichbild "municipal area," Dutch wijk "quarter, district," Old Frisian wik, Old Saxon wic "village."
Example
- 1. Assuming there is sufficient wick material , the body can sustain its own fire for around 7 hours .
- 2. Not a problem - we 've got wick replacements right here .
- 3. It 's very hard to turn the wick up and down .
- 4. L 'm going to light your inner wick .
- 5. On mild days , wear running gloves that wick moisture away .