walk
Meanings
- To move on the feet by alternately setting each foot (or pair or group of feet, in the case of animals with four or more feet) forward, with at least one foot on the ground at all times. Compare run.
- To "walk free", i.e. to win, or avoid, a criminal court case, particularly when actually guilty.
- Of an object, to go missing or be stolen.
- To walk off the field, as if given out, after the fielding side appeals and before the umpire has ruled; done as a matter of sportsmanship when the batsman believes he is out.
- To travel (a distance) by walking.
- To take for a walk or accompany on a walk.
- To allow a batter to reach base by pitching four balls.
- To reach base by being pitched four balls.
- Of an object or machine, to move by shifting between two positions, as if it were walking.
- To cause something to move in such a way.
- To full; to beat (cloth) to give it the consistency of felt.
- To traverse by walking (or analogous gradual movement).
- A trip made by walking.
- A distance walked.
- An Olympic Games track event requiring that the heel of the leading foot touch the ground before the toe of the trailing foot leaves the ground.
- A manner of walking; a person's style of walking.
- A path, sidewalk/pavement or other maintained place on which to walk.
- A person's conduct or course in life.
- A situation where all players fold to the big blind, as their first action (instead of calling or raising), once they get their cards.
- An award of first base to a batter following four balls being thrown by the pitcher; known in the rules as a "base on balls".
- In coffee, coconut, and other plantations, the space between them.
- An area of an estate planted with fruit-bearing trees.
- A place for keeping and training puppies for dogfighting.
- An enclosed area in which a gamecock is confined to prepare him for fighting.
- A surname.
- A particular histidine kinase
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English walk, walke, walken, walkyn, wolken (“to roll, toss, or turn; to walk; to move; to be living; to beat or full; to perform”), a conflation of Old English wealcan (“to move around; to revolve; to roll; to fluctuate; to discuss”) (ġewealcan (“to go, traverse; to roll”)) and Old English wealcian (“to curl, roll up, twist; to wrinkle”); both from Proto-West Germanic *walkan, from Proto-Germanic *walkaną (“to roll, toss, turn, wind; to walk, wander, wend; to full, trample”), *walkōną (“to roll about; to full”), from Proto-Indo-European *walg- (“to twist, turn, move”). Cognates Cognate with Bavarian woikn (“to full, tan; to knead dough; to roll out dough”), Cimbrian balchan (“to beat, hit, strike”), Dutch zwalken (“to walk around”), German walken (“to full, tan, walk; to knead; to beat up”), Danish valke (“to full, walk, waulk”), Faroese válka (“make dirty; stir up dirt”), Swedish valka (“to full cloth, to waulk”); also Latin valgus (“bent out; bandy, bow-legged”). More at vagrant and whelk. Doublet of waulk.