hulk

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See also: Hulk

English

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WOTD – 3 May 2021

Pronunciation

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The French ships Mars, Souverain and Eylau turned into hulks (sense 1.2) and used as barracks for the troupes de marine (marine troops) at Toulon.
A 19th-century photograph of a hulk (sense 1.2) used to hold barrels in Arkhangelsk, Russia.

Etymology 1

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From Middle English hulk, hulke, holke (“hut; shed for hogs; type of ship; husk, pod, shell; large, clumsy person; a giant”)[1] (probably reinforced by From Middle Dutch hulk, huelc, and Middle Low German hulk, holk, hollek (“freighter, cargo ship, barge”)),[2] from Old English hulc (“light ship; heavy, clumsy ship; cabin, hovel, hut”), from Proto-West Germanic *huluk, *hulik, from Proto-Germanic *hulukaz, *hulikaz (“something hollowed or dug out, cavity”), equivalent to hole/hollow +‎ -ock. Cognate with Old High German holcho (“cargo or transport ship, barge”) (whence Middle High German holche, modern German Holk), Old Norse hólkr (“metal tube, ring”), dialectal Norwegian holk, hylke (“wooden barrel”), Middle English holken (“to dig out, gouge”).

Relation to Medieval Latin hulcus (“ship”) is uncertain, as Old English may have borrowed from Latin or vice versa, but the form holcas rather points to borrowing from Ancient Greek ὁλκάς (holkás, “ship being towed; cargo ship, ship used for trading, holcad”) (compare Ancient Greek ἕλκω (hélkō, “to drag”),[3] possibly from Proto-Indo-European *selk- (“to draw, pull”)). See more at the Old English entry hulc.

The verb is derived from the noun.[4]

Noun

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hulk (plural hulks)

  1. (nautical)
    1. (archaic) A large ship used for transportation; (more generally) a large ship that is difficult to manoeuvre.
    3. (by extension) A non-functional but floating ship, usually stripped of equipment and rigging, and often put to other uses such as accommodation or storage.
      • 1918 June, Katherine Mansfield [pseudonym; Kathleen Mansfield Murry], “Prelude”, in Bliss and Other Stories, London: Constable & Company, published 1920, →OCLC, chapter 3, page 8:
        They could see the lighthouse shining on Quarantine Island, and the green lights on the old coal hulks.
      • 1946 March and April, “Notes and News: Anglo-Irish Steamship Fleets”, in Railway Magazine, page 118:
        A sister ship, originally the Patriotic, and later renamed Lady Leinster and finally the Lady Connaught, was badly damaged by a mine between Liverpool and Belfast; the British & Irish Steam Packet Company next brought [sic] the hulk back from the Belfast Steamship Company and converted her into a livestock carrier.
  2. (figuratively) A large structure with a dominating presence.
    • 2019 June 1, Oliver Wainwright, “Super-tall, super-skinny, super-expensive: the ‘pencil towers’ of New York’s super-rich”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 5 October 2020:
      The sturdy trunk of Central Park Tower is rising nearby – a great glass hulk that will soon steal the crown for the most vertiginous residences on the planet.
    • 2020 August 26, “Network News: Stations Investment Boosts Regeneration, Says Report”, in Rail, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 17:
      Among its findings, the report says: "In recent years we have seen more stations transformed from run-down Victorian hulks, or spartan bus-sheltered platforms, into places that people can take pride in, feel comfortable in using, and which are fulfilling more of their wider potential.
  3. (figuratively) A big (and possibly clumsy) person.
    1. (bodybuilding) An excessively muscled person.
Alternative forms
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Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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hulk (third-person singular simple present hulks, present participle hulking, simple past and past participle hulked)

  1. (transitive, nautical)
    1. To reduce (a ship) to a non-functional hulk.
      • 2003, Gordon de L. Marshall, Ships' Figure Heads in Australia, Tangee Publishing, →ISBN, page 52:
        In Fremantle very few vessels appear to have been reduced to hulks, and only one figure head Samuel Plimsoll, [Fig. 62] survives from a sailing ship hulked in 1904. [...] The Sarah Burnyeat was hulked in Albany in 1886, [...]
      • 2017, Rif Winfield, Stephen S Roberts, French Warships in the Age of Sail 1626–1786, Seaforth Publsihing, →ISBN, page 203:
        No further additions were made to this group, and by 1729 the Rank was extinct (the last to be struck was the Ludlow, which had been hulked in 1719).
    2. To temporarily house (goods, people, etc.) in such a hulk.
  2. (transitive) To move (a large, hulking body).
    • 1968, Francis Russell, The Shadow of Blooming Grove - Warren G. Harding in His Times, →ISBN:
      This hearty, willing man had hulked his 354 pounds about the world, faithfully and deftly running presidential errands in Cuba, Panama, the Philippines, Rome, Russia, and Japan and China.
    • 1994, Alison Hawthorne Deming, Science and Other Poems, LSU Press, →ISBN, page 16:
      A man with four children crowding like saplings around him whistles to wake up the elephant seal who has hulked his impossible body onto the beach.
    • 2017, N.D.Rabin, Hidden Magic: Fear of the Smallest Wizard, AuthorHouse, →ISBN:
      Hadrian hulked his mass over the spot where the children had disappeared. 'You are still here, aren't you? I can feel your presence.' He walked forwards and his giant strides came down on the children. They scrambled out the way, [...]
  3. (intransitive) To be a hulk, that is, a large, hulking, and often imposing presence.
    • 1992, Richard Condon, The Venerable Bead, Macmillan, →ISBN, page 163:
      After one trip with them, he decided he couldn't stand to have bodyguards hulking around him wherever he went. He felt like an idiot walking along the aisles of the supermarket with eight lumpy men standing around [...]
    • 2006, Angus Dunn, Writing in the Sand, Luath Press Ltd, →ISBN:
      As the occupants stepped out, he hulked at them menacingly and asked them the traditional question. 'Can Ah help youse?'
    • 2007, Cheryl Strayed, Torch, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN, page 156:
      An oven hulked in the middle of the room, detached from everything, and a gathering of objects sat in the corner: a rolled rug with gnarled tassels, a chair from the bar downstairs that was missing a leg, a box [...]
    • 2008, J. D. Robb, Three in Death, Penguin, →ISBN:
      The remains of an old bar hulked in the center of the room. As it was draped with more dusty protective cloth, she assumed Hopkins had intended to restore it to whatever its former glory might have been.
    • 2012, Paul Melko, The Broken Universe, Tor Books, →ISBN, page 314:
      The whoosh pushed John down, and as he fell, he turned to see the machine hulking over him, just meters away. “Shit!” he cried [...]
  4. (intransitive) Of a (large) person: to act or move slowly and clumsily.
    • 1934, Gösta Larsson, Our Daily Bread: A Novel:
      After a while he hulked up to where Erland sat, putting his hairy fist on the table and watching the boy work.
    • 2008, Craig Conte, Millennial Reign, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 301:
      Instead he hulked his way towards Kruger again as the crowd ooohd and aaahd at the prowess. The two men were about equal in height, but Matusak outweighed Kruger by about fifty pounds.
Derived terms
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Translations
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Etymology 2

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A variant of holk (“to dig out, hollow out, make hollow; to dig up, excavate; to dig into, investigate”),[5] from Middle English holken (“to dig out, hollow out; to dig up, excavate”)[6] (compare holk (“a hollow; body cavity”)),[7] perhaps from Middle Low German hȫlken (“to hollow out, gouge”), ultimately from Proto-Germanic *hulaz (“hollow”, adjective);[8] further etymology uncertain, perhaps either from Proto-Indo-European *ḱel- (“to cover”), or *ḱewh₁- (“to swell; to be strong”). Compare also Old English āhlocian (“to dig out”).

Verb

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hulk (third-person singular simple present hulks, present participle hulking, simple past and past participle hulked)

  1. (transitive, obsolete except British, dialectal) To remove the entrails of; to disembowel.

References

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  1. ^ “hulk, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  2. ^ “hulk, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
  3. ^ “hulk, n.2”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1899.
  4. ^ “hulk, v.3”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1899.
  5. ^ “hulk, v.2”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1899.
  6. ^ “holken, v.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  7. ^ “holk(e, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.
  8. ^ “holk | howk, v.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1899; compare “holl, adj.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1899.

Further reading

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Anagrams

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Lower Sorbian

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Noun

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hulk m inan

  1. Obsolete spelling of wulk.

Declension

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Declension of hulk
Singular Dual Plural
Nominative hulk hulka hulki
Genitive hulka hulkowu hulkow
Dative hulkoju hulkoma hulkam
Accusative hulk hulka hulki
Instrumental hulkom hulkoma hulkami
Locative hulku hulkoma hulkach

Middle Low German

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Noun

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hulk m

  1. Alternative form of holk

References

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