brake

Meanings

Noun

• A fern; bracken (Pteridium).
• Ferns in the genus Pteris
• A thicket, or an area overgrown with briers etc.
• A tool used for breaking flax or hemp.
• A type of machine for bending sheet metal. (See wikipedia.)
• A large, heavy harrow for breaking clods after ploughing; a drag.
• An ancient engine of war analogous to the crossbow and ballista.
• The handle of a pump.
• A device used to slow or stop the motion of a wheel, or of a vehicle, usually by friction (although other resistive forces, such as electromagnetic fields or aerodynamic drag, can also be used); also, the controls or apparatus used to engage such a mechanism such as the pedal in a car.
• A baker's kneading trough.
• A device used to confine or prevent the motion of an animal.
• That part of a carriage, as of a movable battery, or engine, which enables it to turn.
• A cage.
• A type of torture instrument.

Verb

• To bruise and crush; to knead
• To pulverise with a harrow
• To operate (a) brake(s).
• To be stopped or slowed (as if) by braking.
• Past of break

Related

Opposite words

• floor it, put the pedal to the metal, redline
• accelerate

Origin

• Apparently a shortened form of bracken. (Compare chick, chicken.)
• From Old English bracu, first attested in plural form fearnbraca, probably from Proto-Germanic *brekaną ("to break") and influenced by brake#Etymology_1. Compare Middle Low German brake ("stump, branch").
• Late Middle English, from Middle Low German brake, Dutch braak, Old Dutch braeke; possibly related to brake#Etymology_4.
• Image:Disc brake.jpg|thumb|right|Disk brake on a motorcycle.
• Origin uncertain; possibly from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German brake ("nose ring, curb, flax brake"), which according to Watkins is related to brake#Etymology_3 and from Proto-Germanic *brekaną ("to break").
• Origin uncertain.
• Inflected forms.