box

A woman practising boxing in Brazil

Meanings

Verb

Noun

  • Any of various evergreen shrubs or trees of the genus Buxus, especially the common box, European box, or boxwood (Buxus sempervirens) which is often used for making hedges and topiary.
  • The wood from a box tree: boxwood.
  • A musical instrument, especially one made from boxwood.
  • An evergreen tree of the genus Lophostemon (for example, the box scrub, Brisbane box, brush box, pink box, or Queensland box, Lophostemon confertus (species)).
  • Various species of Eucalyptus trees are popularly called various kinds of boxes, on the basis of the nature of their wood, bark, or appearance for example, the drooping (Eucalyptus bicolor), shiny-leaved (Eucalyptus tereticornis), black, or ironbark box trees.
  • A blow with the fist.
  • A Mediterranean food fish of the genus Boops, which is a variety of sea bream; a bogue or oxeye.

Related

Similar words

Opposite words

Narrower meaning words

Origin

  • From Middle English box ("jar (usually cylindrical); type of container; strongbox for valuables or its contents; cupping glass for bloodletting; bone socket"), from Old English box ("box-tree; box, case"), from Proto-West Germanic *buhsā ("box tree; thing made from boxwood; box"), either from Latin buxus ("box tree; thing made from boxwood"), buxum (possibly from πύξος); or from Late Latin buxis ("box"), Latin pyxis ("small box for medicines or toiletries") (from Ancient Greek πυξίς ("box or tablet made of boxwood; box; cylinder"), from πύξος + -ῐς).
  • If the latter derivation is correct, the word is cognate with Middle Dutch bosse, busse (modern Dutch bos ("wood, forest"), bus), Old High German buhsa (Middle High German buhse, bühse, modern German Büchse ("box; can")), Swedish hjulbössa ("wheel-box").
  • The humorous plural form boxen is from box + -en, by analogy with oxen.
  • From Middle English box ("box tree; boxwood"), from Old English box ("box tree"), from Proto-West Germanic *buhs ("box tree; thing made from boxwood"), from Latin buxus ("box tree; thing made from boxwood"), buxum, possibly from πύξος.
  • From Middle English box ("a blow; a stroke with a weapon"); further origin uncertain. The following etymologies have been suggested:
  • Possibly related to Proto-Germanic *boki-, whence Danish bask ("a blow; a stripe"), Danish baske, Middle Dutch boke ("a blow, a hit"), bōken (modern Dutch beuken), West Frisian bûtse, bûtsje, Saterland Frisian batsje, Low German betschen, Middle High German buc ("a blow, a stroke"), bochen.
  • Possibly onomatopoeic.
  • Possibly from box (“cuboid space; container”), perhaps referring to the shape of the fist.
  • Possibly from Ancient Greek πύξ ("with clenched fist"), πυγμή.
  • The verb is from Middle English boxen ("to beat or whip (an animal)"), which is derived from the noun.
  • From Latin bōx, from Ancient Greek βῶξ ("box (marine fish)"), from βοῦς + ὤψ, a reference to the large size of the fish's eyes relative to its body.

Modern English dictionary

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