Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Prick?

\Prick\, n. [AS. prica, pricca, pricu; akin to LG. prick, pricke, D. prik, Dan. prik, prikke, Sw. prick. Cf. {Prick}, v.] 1. That which pricks, penetrates, or punctures; a sharp and slender thing; a pointed instrument; a goad; a spur, etc.; a point; a skewer. Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary. --Shak. It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. --Acts ix. 5. 2. The act of pricking, or the sensation of being pricked; a sharp, stinging pain; figuratively, remorse. ``The pricks of conscience.'' --A. Tucker. 3. A mark made by a pointed instrument; a puncture; a point. Hence: (a) A point or mark on the dial, noting the hour. [Obs.] ``The prick of noon.'' --Shak. (b) The point on a target at which an archer aims; the mark; the pin. ``They that shooten nearest the prick.'' --Spenser. (c) A mark denoting degree; degree; pitch. [Obs.] ``To prick of highest praise forth to advance.'' --Spenser. (d) A mathematical point; -- regularly used in old English translations of Euclid. (e) The footprint of a hare. [Obs.] 4. (Naut.) A small roll; as, a prick of spun yarn; a prick of tobacco.
\Prick\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Pricked}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Pricking}.] [AS. prician; akin to LG. pricken, D. prikken, Dan. prikke, Sw. pricka. See {Prick}, n., and cf. {Prink}, {Prig}.] 1. To pierce slightly with a sharp-pointed instrument or substance; to make a puncture in, or to make by puncturing; to drive a fine point into; as, to prick one with a pin, needle, etc.; to prick a card; to prick holes in paper. 2. To fix by the point; to attach or hang by puncturing; as, to prick a knife into a board. --Sir I. Newton. The cooks prick it [a slice] on a prong of iron. --Sandys. 3. To mark or denote by a puncture; to designate by pricking; to choose; to mark; -- sometimes with off. Some who are pricked for sheriffs. --Bacon. Let the soldiers for duty be carefully pricked off. --Sir W. Scott. Those many, then, shall die: their names are pricked. --Shak. 4. To mark the outline of by puncturing; to trace or form by pricking; to mark by punctured dots; as, to prick a pattern for embroidery; to prick the notes of a musical composition. --Cowper. 5. To ride or guide with spurs; to spur; to goad; to incite; to urge on; -- sometimes with on, or off. Who pricketh his blind horse over the fallows. --Chaucer. The season pricketh every gentle heart. --Chaucer. My duty pricks me on to utter that. --Shak. 6. To affect with sharp pain; to sting, as with remorse. ``I was pricked with some reproof.'' --Tennyson. Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart. --Acts ii. 37. 7. To make sharp; to erect into a point; to raise, as something pointed; -- said especially of the ears of an animal, as a horse or dog; and usually followed by up; -- hence, to prick up the ears, to listen sharply; to have the attention and interest strongly engaged. ``The courser . . . pricks up his ears.'' --Dryden. 8. To render acid or pungent. [Obs.] --Hudibras. 9. To dress; to prink; -- usually with up. [Obs.] 10. (Naut) (a) To run a middle seam through, as the cloth of a sail. (b) To trace on a chart, as a ship's course. 11. (Far.) (a) To drive a nail into (a horse's foot), so as to cause lameness. (b) To nick.
\Prick\, v. i. 1. To be punctured; to suffer or feel a sharp pain, as by puncture; as, a sore finger pricks. 2. To spur onward; to ride on horseback. --Milton. A gentle knight was pricking on the plain. --Spenser. 3. To become sharp or acid; to turn sour, as wine. 4. To aim at a point or mark. --Hawkins.