shock

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A sudden, upsetting, or surprising event or feeling.

   It came as a shock to learn that our favorite restaurant had closed.

2. 2
   noun

   A sudden painful feeling caused by electricity passing through the body.

   He got a small electric shock from the faulty plug.

3. 3
   verb

   To make someone feel very surprised, upset, or offended.

   The news of the bombing shocked the whole country.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Shock came from French choc in the mid-16th century, initially as a military term for an encounter between two charging forces or jousters. For shock in the expression a shock of hair, the word originally referred to a dog with long shaggy hair and may be the same as the earlier word shough, meaning a lapdog said to come from Iceland.

From Middle Dutch schokken (“to push, jolt, shake, jerk”) or Middle French choquer (“to collide with, clash”), from Old Dutch *skokkan (“to shake up and down, shog”), from Proto-Germanic *skukkaną (“to move, shake, tremble”). Of uncertain origin. Perhaps related to Proto-Germanic *skakaną (“to shake, stir”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kek-, *(s)keg- (“to shake, stir”); see shake. Cognate with Middle Low German schocken (“collide with, deliver a blow to, move back and forth”), Old High German scoc (“a jolt, swing”), Middle High German schocken (“to swing”) (German schaukeln), Old Norse skykkr…

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External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary