crock

Meanings

Noun

• A stoneware or earthenware jar or storage container.
• A piece of broken pottery, a shard.
• A person who is physically limited by age, illness or injury.
• An old or broken-down vehicle (and formerly a horse or ewe).
• Silly talk, a foolish belief, a poor excuse, nonsense.
• A low stool.
• A patient who is difficult to treat, especially one who complains of a minor or imagined illness.
• The loose black particles collected from combustion, as on pots and kettles, or in a chimney; soot; smut.
• Colouring matter that rubs off from cloth.

Verb

• To break something or injure someone.
• To transfer coloring through abrasion from one item to another.
• To cover the drain holes of a planter with stones or similar material, in order to ensure proper drainage.
• To put or store (something) in a crock or pot.
• To give off crock or smut.

Origin

• From Middle English crok, crokke, from Old English crocc, crocca, from Proto-Germanic *krukkō, *krukkô, from Proto-Indo-European *growg-. The English word is cognate with Danish and Norwegian krukke, Dutch kruik, regional German Kruke, Icelandic krukka, Old English crōg, crōh. See also cruse.
• Compare Welsh croeg ("cover"), Scots crochit ("covered").