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Croak

//kɹoʊk// name, noun, verb, slang

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A surname from Irish.
Noun
  1. 1
    A faint, harsh sound made in the throat.
  2. 2
    a harsh hoarse utterance (as of a frog) wordnet
  3. 3
    The call of a frog or toad.
  4. 4
    The harsh call of various birds, such as the raven or corncrake, or other creatures.
Verb
  1. 1
    To make a croak sound. intransitive
  2. 2
    pass from physical life and lose all bodily attributes and functions necessary to sustain life wordnet
  3. 3
    To utter in a low, hoarse voice. transitive

    "The raven himself is hoarse, / That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan."

  4. 4
    make complaining remarks or noises under one's breath wordnet
  5. 5
    To make its vocal sound. intransitive
Show 5 more definitions
  1. 6
    utter a hoarse sound, like a raven wordnet
  2. 7
    To die. slang
  3. 8
    To kill. slang, transitive

    "He'd seen my face, so I had to croak him."

  4. 9
    To complain; especially, to grumble; to forebode evil; to utter complaints or forebodings habitually.

    "Marat […] croaks with such reasonableness."

  5. 10
    To abort the current program indicating a user or caller error. slang

    "The accessor croaks if it's not an appropriate object reference."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From Middle English *croken, crouken, (also represented by craken > crake), back-formation from Old English crācettan (“to croak”) (also in derivative crǣcetung (“croaking”)), from Proto-Germanic *krēk-, from Proto-Indo-European *greh₂-g-, from *greh₂-k-, of onomatopoeic origin. See also Swedish kråka, German krächzen, Sanskrit गर्जति (garjati, “to growl”); also compare Latin grāculus (“jackdaw”), Serbo-Croatian grákati. More at crack, crake and craic.

Etymology 2

From Middle English *croken, crouken, (also represented by craken > crake), back-formation from Old English crācettan (“to croak”) (also in derivative crǣcetung (“croaking”)), from Proto-Germanic *krēk-, from Proto-Indo-European *greh₂-g-, from *greh₂-k-, of onomatopoeic origin. See also Swedish kråka, German krächzen, Sanskrit गर्जति (garjati, “to growl”); also compare Latin grāculus (“jackdaw”), Serbo-Croatian grákati. More at crack, crake and craic.

Etymology 3

Variant of Croke.

See also for "croak"

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