trunk

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   compartment in an automobile that carries luggage or shopping or tools

   I put my golf bag in the trunk.

2. 2
   noun

   A container.

   There is an hour or two, after the passengers have embarked, which is disquieting and fussy. Mail bags, so I understand, are being put on board. Stewards, carrying cabin trunks, swarm in the corridors.

3. 3
   noun

   The main line or body of anything.

   the trunk of a vein or of an artery, as distinct from the branches

4. 4
   verb

   To lop off; to curtail; to truncate.

   Large streames of bloud out of the truncked stocke / Forth gushed, like fresh water streame from riuen rocke.

5. 5
   noun

   a long flexible snout as of an elephant

6. 6
   noun

   luggage consisting of a large strong case used when traveling or for storage

7. 7
   noun

   the body excluding the head and neck and limbs

8. 8
   noun

   the main stem of a tree

Etymology

From Middle English tronke, trunke, from Old French tronc (“alms box, tree trunk, headless body”), from Latin truncus (“a stock, lopped tree trunk”), from truncus (“cut off, maimed, mutilated”). For the verb, compare French tronquer, and see truncate. Doublet of truncus and tronk.