Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Turk
Turk
(tûrk)
, Noun.
[Per.
Turk
; probably of Tartar origin: cf. F. Turc
.] 1.
A member of any of numerous Tartar tribes of Central Asia, etc.; esp., one of the dominant race in Turkey.
2.
A native or inhabitant of Turkey.
3.
A Muslim; esp., one living in Turkey.
[Archaic]
It is no good reason for a man’s religion that he was born and brought up in it; for then a
Turk
would have as much reason to be a Turk
as a Christian to be a Christian. Chillingworth.
4.
(Zool.)
Turk's cap
. (Bot.)
(a)
Turk's-cap lily. See under
Lily
. (b)
A tulip.
(c)
– Turk's head
. (a)
(Naut.)
A knot of turbanlike form worked on a rope with a piece of small line.
R. H. Dana, Jr.
(b)
(Bot.)
See
– Turk's cap
(c)
above. Turk's turban
(Bot.)
, a plant of the genus
Ranunculus
; crowfoot.Definition 2024
Turk
Turk
English
Alternative forms
- Turke (obsolete)
Noun
Turk (plural Turks)
- A person from Turkey.
- A speaker of the various Turkic languages.
- (obsolete) A Muslim.
- 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essayes, London: Edward Blount, OCLC 946730821, II.12:
- Compare but our manners unto a Turke [transl. Mahometan], or a Pagan, and we must needs yeeld unto them […].
- Chillingworth
- It is no good reason for a man's religion that he was born and brought up in it; for then a Turk would have as much reason to be a Turk as a Christian to be a Christian.
- 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essayes, London: Edward Blount, OCLC 946730821, II.12:
- (archaic) A bloodthirsty and savage person; vandal; barbarian.[1][from 16th c.]
- 1579, John Lyly, Euphues, page 42:
- Was neuer any Impe so wicked and barbarous, any Turke so vyle and brutishe.
- 1760, Tobias George Smollett (editor), The Critical Review: Or, Annals of Literature, Volume 9, page 20:
- A sort of primitive barbarity distinguishes the whole; no variety of character appears; and to call a man Turk is to say, that he is jealous, haughty, covetous, ignorant, and lascivious; at the same time that a certain dignity of gait, and magnificence of manners, gives him the appearance of generosity and true greatness of soul.
- 1987, Anne Mozley, Essays from "Blackwood", page 21:
- A bad temper does seem often favourable to health. The man who has been a Turk all his life lives long to plague all about him.
- 1906, George Meredith, One of our conquerors, page 292:
- As much as the wilfully or naturally blunted, the intelligently honest have to learn by touch: only, their understandings cannot meanwhile be so wholly obtuse as our society's matron, acting to please the tastes of the civilized man—a creature that is not clean-washed of the Turk in him—barbarously exacts.
- 1928, Luṫfī Levonian, Moslem mentality: a discussion of the presentation of Christianity to Moslems, page 85:
- They regarded the very word Turk as synonymous with ignorance, impoliteness, and idiocy. To call a man 'Turk' was regarded as a great dishonour to him.
- 1579, John Lyly, Euphues, page 42:
- (US, slang) A homosexual, assuming the active role in anal sex.
- 1938, Aaron Joshua Rosanoff, Manual of psychiatry and mental hygiene, page 159:
- The clannishness of homosexuals has led to the development of special slang expressions among them: Temperamental or queer, a homosexual person. Turk, wolf, or jocker, an active sodomist.
- 1993, Jonathon Green, Slang down the ages: the historical development of slang, page 231:
- […] turd-packer, hitchhiker on the Hershey highway (fr. the US Hershey chocolate bars), shirt-lifter (Australian), wind-jammer, fart-catcher, dirt tamper, pillow-biter and Turk (fr. the alleged national propensity for sodomy).
- 2006, Deborah Cameron, On language and sexual politics, page 35:
- One of the many underworld synonyms for an active pederast is turk.
- 1938, Aaron Joshua Rosanoff, Manual of psychiatry and mental hygiene, page 159:
- A member of a Mestee group in South Carolina.
Translations
member of Turkic speaking ethnic group
Turkish national
|
|
Muslim — see Muslim
bloodthirsty and savage person
Derived terms
Anagrams
References
- ↑ J[ohn] A. Simpson and E[dward] S. C. Weiner, editors (1989) The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, ISBN 978-0-19-861186-8.
turk
turk
Albanian
Noun
turk m (indefinite plural turq, definite singular turku, definite plural turqit)
Related terms
- Turqi
- turqisht
- turqishte