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[rak] /ræk/

noun
1.
ruin or destruction; wrack.
Verb phrases
2.
rack up, Slang. to wreck, especially a vehicle.
Idioms
3.
go to rack and ruin, to decay, decline, or become destroyed:
His property went to rack and ruin in his absence.
/ræk/
noun
1.
a framework for holding, carrying, or displaying a specific load or object: a plate rack, a hat rack, a hay rack, a luggage rack
2.
a toothed bar designed to engage a pinion to form a mechanism that will interconvert rotary and rectilinear motions
3.
a framework fixed to an aircraft for carrying bombs, rockets, etc
4.
the rack, an instrument of torture that stretched the body of the victim
5.
a cause or state of mental or bodily stress, suffering, etc; anguish; torment (esp in the phrase on the rack)
6.
(slang, mainly US) a woman’s breasts
7.
(US & Canadian, in pool, snooker, etc)

verb (transitive)
8.
to torture on the rack
9.
Also wrack. to cause great stress or suffering to: guilt racked his conscience
10.
Also wrack. to strain or shake (something) violently, as by great physical force: the storm racked the town
11.
to place or arrange in or on a rack: to rack bottles of wine
12.
to move (parts of machinery or a mechanism) using a toothed rack
13.
to raise (rents) exorbitantly; rack-rent
14.
rack one’s brains, to strain in mental effort, esp to remember something or to find the solution to a problem
/ræk/
noun
1.
destruction; wreck (obsolete except in the phrase go to rack and ruin)
/ræk/
noun
1.
another word for single-foot, a gait of the horse
/ræk/
noun
1.
a group of broken clouds moving in the wind
verb
2.
(intransitive) (of clouds) to be blown along by the wind
/ræk/
verb (transitive)
1.
to clear (wine, beer, etc) as by siphoning it off from the dregs
2.
to fill a container with (beer, wine, etc)
/ræk/
noun
1.
the neck or rib section of mutton, pork, or veal
n.

“frame with bars,” c.1300, possibly from Middle Dutch rec “framework,” literally “something stretched out, related to recken (modern rekken) “stretch out,” cognate with Old English reccan “to stretch out,” from Proto-Germanic *rak- (cf. Old Saxon rekkian, Old Frisian reza, Old Norse rekja, Old High German recchen, German recken, Gothic uf-rakjan “to stretch out”), from PIE *rog-, from root *reg- “to move in a straight line” (see regal).

Meaning “instrument of torture” first recorded early 15c., perhaps from German rackbank, originally an implement for stretching leather, etc. Mechanical meaning “toothed bar” is from 1797 (see pinion). Meaning “set of antlers” is first attested 1945, American English; hence slang sense of “a woman’s breasts” (especially if large), by 1991. Meaning “framework for displaying clothes” is from 1948; hence off the rack (1951) of clothing, as opposed to tailored.

type of gait of a horse, 1580s, from rack (v.) “move with a fast, lively gait” 1520s in this sense (implied in racking), of unknown origin; perhaps from French racquassure “racking of a horse in his pace,” itself of unknown origin. Or perhaps a variant of rock (v.1).

“clouds driven before the wind,” c.1300, also “rush of wind, collision, crash,” originally a northern word, possibly from Old English racu “cloud” (or an unrecorded Scandinavian cognate of it), reinforced by Old Norse rek “wreckage, jetsam,” or by influence of Old English wræc “something driven;” from Proto-Germanic *wrakaz, from PIE root *wreg- “to push, shove” (see wreak-). Often confused with wrack (n.), especially in phrase rack and ruin (1590s). The distinction is that rack is “driven clouds;” wrack is “seaweed cast up on shore.”

“cut of animal meat and bones,” 1560s, of unknown origin; perhaps from some resemblance to rack (n.1). Cf. rack-bone “vertebrae” (1610s).
v.

“to stretch out for drying,” also “to torture on the rack,” early 15c., from rack (n.1). Of other pains from 1580s. Figurative sense of “to torment” is from c.1600. Meaning “raise above a fair level” (of rent, etc.) is from 1550s. Meaning “fit with racks” is from 1580s. Teenager slang meaning “to sleep” is from 1960s (rack (n.) was Navy slang for “bed” in 1940s). Related: Racked; racking. Rack up “register, accumulate, achieve” is first attested 1943 (in “Billboard”), probably from method of keeping score in pool halls.

verb

Related Terms

meat rack, off-the-rack, rim-rock

[probably fr torture on the rack, a stretching machine, the verb found by 1433]