truck

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   convey (goods etc.) by truck

   truck fresh vegetables across the mountains

2. 2
   noun

   A small wheel or roller, specifically the wheel of a gun carriage.

   “Put that cannon up once, and I'll answer for it that no Injin faces it. 'Twill be as good as a dozen sentinels,” answered Joel. “As for mountin’, I thought of that before I said a syllable about the crittur. There's the new truck-wheels in the court, all ready to hold it, and the carpenters can put the hinder part to the whull, in an hour or two.”

3. 3
   noun

   On a wooden mast, a circular disc (or sometimes a rectangle) of wood near or at the top of the mast, usually with holes or sheaves to reeve signal halyards; also a temporary or emergency place for a lookout. "Main" refers to the mainmast, whereas a truck on another mast may be called (on the mizzenmast, for example) "mizzen-truck".

   But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the main-truck higher than the kelson is low?

4. 4
   noun

   A heavier motor vehicle designed to carry goods or to pull a semi-trailer designed to carry goods; (in Malaysia/Singapore) a such vehicle with a closed or covered carriage.

   We rented a truck big enough to carry the whole load in one trip.

5. 5
   noun

   Any smaller wagon or cart or vehicle of various designs, pushed or pulled by hand or (obsolete) pulled by an animal, used to move and sometimes lift goods, like those in hotels for moving luggage or in libraries for moving books.

   Goods were therefore conveyed about the town almost exclusively in trucks drawn by dogs.

6. 6
   noun

   Dirt or other messiness.

   “Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What is that truck?”

7. 7
   verb

   To drive a truck.

   My father has been trucking for 20 years.

8. 8
   verb

   To convey by truck.

   Last week, Cletus trucked 100 pounds of lumber up to Dubuque.

Etymology

From Middle English truken, troken, trukien, from Old English trucian (“to fail, run short, deceive, disappoint”), from Proto-West Germanic *trokōn (“to fail, miss, lack”), from Proto-Indo-European *derew-, *derwu- (“to tear, wrap, reap”), from Proto-Indo-European *der- (“to flay, split”). Cognate with Middle Low German troggelen (“to cheat, deceive, swindle”), Dutch troggelen (“to extort”), German dialectal truggeln (“to flatter, fawn”).