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Heck

//hɛk// intj, name, noun, verb, slang

Definitions

Intj
  1. 1
    Hell. euphemistic

    "Heck, what did I expect? It's too muddy out to go biking today."

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A hardy breed of domestic cattle, the result of an attempt to breed back the extinct aurochs from modern aurochs-derived cattle in the 1920s and 1930s.
  2. 2
    A surname, possibly from German.
  3. 3
    A civil parish in North Yorkshire, England, previously in Selby district, with the villages of Great Heck and Little Heck.
  4. 4
    A hamlet in Dumfries and Galloway council area, Scotland (OS grid ref NY0980).
Noun
  1. 1
    Hell. euphemistic, uncountable

    "You can go to heck as far as I'm concerned."

  2. 2
    The bolt or latch of a door. informal
  3. 3
    A rack for cattle to feed at. informal
  4. 4
    A door, especially one partly of latticework. informal, obsolete
  5. 5
    A latticework contrivance for catching fish. informal
Show 2 more definitions
  1. 6
    An apparatus for separating the threads of warps into sets, as they are wound upon the reel from the bobbins, in a warping machine. informal
  2. 7
    A bend or winding of a stream. informal
Verb
  1. 1
    to break, to destroy informal
  2. 2
    to mess up informal

Etymology

Etymology 1

Late 19th century, originally dialectal northern English, from a euphemistic alteration of hell.

Etymology 2

Late 19th century, originally dialectal northern English, from a euphemistic alteration of hell.

Etymology 3

Blend of to heck (“destroyed, messed up”) + fuck, possibly supported by feck.

Etymology 4

See hatch (“a half door”).

Etymology 5

English, Dutch and south German surname, all from words meaning "hedge," "enclosure," "fence," from *haggju. Compare Van Heck, Hatch.

See also for "heck"

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