thwack
Meanings
- To hit (someone or something) hard, especially with a flat implement or a stick; to thrash, to whack.
- To drive or force (someone or something) by, or as if by, beating or hitting; to knock.
- To pack (people or things) closely together; to cram.
- To decisively defeat (someone) in a contest; to beat, to thrash.
- To crowd or pack (a place or thing) with people, objects, etc.
- To fall down hard with a thump.
- To be crammed or filled full.
- Of people: to crowd or pack a place.
- An act of hitting hard, especially with a flat implement or a stick; a whack; also, a powerful stroke involved in such hitting; a blow, a strike.
- A dull or heavy slapping sound.
- Used to represent the dull or heavy sound of someone or something being hit or slapped.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
The verb is probably: * partly onomatopoeic, from the sound of something being beaten (compare whack); and * partly derived from Late Middle English twakken, twake (“to hit (someone) with something; to pat; to stroke”), probably from Middle English thakken, thakke (“to dab; to pat; to stroke”) [and other forms] (whence thack (obsolete except Britain, dialectal)), from Old English þaccian (“to beat; to pat; to touch softly, stroke; to strike gently, clap, tap”), from Proto-West Germanic *þakkōn, from Proto-Germanic *þakwōną (“to pat; to tap; to touch”), from Proto-Indo-European *teh₂g- (“to grasp with the hand; to touch”). Doublet of tangent. The noun and interjection are derived from the verb. Cognates * Latin tangō (“touch”) * Old Dutch þakolōn (“to stroke”) * Old Norse þykkr (“a blow, thump, thwack”) (Icelandic þjaka, þjökka (“to beat, thump, thwack”); Norwegian tjåka (“to strike, beat”))