bank
NOUN · English · homograph 2: etymology 2
Experimental / limited support
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The corpus records 9 senses of bank. Each sense below has its own Add to list, so you choose the one you mean.
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Experimental coverage — measured below Partial on the number of recorded words, definitions, translations, word forms and pronunciation. Treat entries as evidence to check; meanings may be incomplete.
English is Experimental in Words. Support is measured, not declared: a language reaches Partial only when every measure meets its threshold, and a measure that has not been taken does not count. The development corpus holds 60 source-backed words in English. What is shown may be incomplete, and pronunciation audio, generated forms and generated examples are not offered.
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Definition: An edge of river, lake, or other watercourse. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
- Tiber trembled underneath her banks. 1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
- On the opposite bank of the river other Chinese units attacked Taoshih and Yunmeng north-west of Hankow. 1943 June 8, “Jap Remnants Suffer Heavy Casualties: Alerts In Chungking”, in The Bombay Chronicle, volume XXXI, number 134, page 1:
- Just upstream of Dryburgh Abbey, a reproduction of a classical Greek temple stands at the top of a wooded hillock on the river’s north bank. 2014 September 16, Ian Jack, “Is this the end of Britishness”, in The Guardian:
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Definition: An elevation under the sea; a shallow area of shifting sand, gravel, mud, and so forth From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
- the banks of Newfoundland Usage example — not an attested quotation.
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Definition: A slope of earth, sand, etc.; an embankment. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
No example is recorded for this sense.
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Definition: The incline of an aircraft, especially during a turn. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
No example is recorded for this sense.
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Definition: An incline, a hill. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
- This is the hardest duty on the railway, for the trains are heavy and there are some long 1 in 40 banks. 1940 December, O. S. M. Raw, “The Rhodesia Railways—II”, in Railway Magazine, page 640:
- It's just as quick out of the blocks. The five-car unit has three engines, giving it 2,820hp to play with, so the once-'feared' Devon banks of Hemerdon, Rattery and Dainton are child's play to these trains. 2025 November 12, 'Mystery Shopper', “Is Devon the cream of the crop?”, in RAIL, number 1048, page 48:
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Definition: A mass of clouds. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
- The bank of clouds on the horizon announced the arrival of the predicted storm front. Usage example — not an attested quotation.
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Definition: The face of the coal at which miners are working. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
No example is recorded for this sense.
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Definition: A deposit of ore or coal, worked by excavations above water level. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
No example is recorded for this sense.
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Definition: The ground at the top of a shaft. From a source of medium confidence.
No translation has been attempted for this sense.
- Ores are brought to bank. Usage example — not an attested quotation.
No paradigm has been compiled for this word yet.
Etymology: From Middle English bank, banke, from Old English *banca (“bench”) (attested in Old English hōbanca (“couch”) and Old English banc (“bank, hillock, embankment”), from Proto-West Germanic *bankō, from Proto-Germanic *bankô. Akin to Old Norse bakki (“elevation, hill”), Norwegian bakke (“slope, hill”). From a source of medium confidence.
No related word is recorded for this word.