loaf

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A shaped piece of baked bread that you cut into slices.

   I bought a fresh loaf of bread from the bakery.

2. 2
   noun

   Food other than bread shaped into a block and baked.

   She made a delicious meat loaf for the family.

3. 3
   verb

   To spend time being lazy and doing nothing.

   I loafed around the house all weekend.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

The noun loaf comes from Old English and originally meant both bread in general and a shaped quantity of bread. In the British phrase use your loaf, "use your common sense," loaf probably comes from the rhyming-slang phrase loaf of bread meaning "head."

Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *hlaibaz Proto-West Germanic *hlaib Old English hlāf Middle English lof English loaf * From Middle English laf, lof, loof, from Old English hlāf (“bread; loaf”), from Proto-West Germanic *hlaib, from Proto-Germanic *hlaibaz (“bread; loaf”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps related to Old English hlifian (“to stand out prominently, tower up”). Cognates Cognate with German Laib (“loaf”), Danish and Swedish lev (“loaf”), Faroese leivur (“an oblong bun”), Icelandic hleifur (“loaf”), Norwegian Nynorsk leiv (“loaf”), Gothic 𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌹𐌱𐍃 (hlaibs), 𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌹𐍆𐍃 (hlaifs, “bread”) (whence…

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