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Prick   /prɪk/   Listen
noun
Prick  n.  
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." "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks."
2.
The act of pricking, or the sensation of being pricked; a sharp, stinging pain; figuratively, remorse. "The pricks of conscience."
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."
(b)
The point on a target at which an archer aims; the mark; the pin. "They that shooten nearest the prick."
(c)
A mark denoting degree; degree; pitch. (Obs.) "To prick of highest praise forth to advance."
(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.


verb
Prick  v. t.  (past & past part. pricked; pres. part. pricking)  
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. "The cooks prick it (a slice) on a prong of iron."
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." "Let the soldiers for duty be carefully pricked off." "Those many, then, shall die: their names are pricked."
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.
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." "The season pricketh every gentle heart." "My duty pricks me on to utter that."
6.
To affect with sharp pain; to sting, as with remorse. "I was pricked with some reproof." "Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart."
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."
8.
To render acid or pungent. (Obs.)
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. "A gentle knight was pricking on the plain."
3.
To become sharp or acid; to turn sour, as wine.
4.
To aim at a point or mark.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Prick" Quotes from Famous Books



... spreads out his cutting-board for the last time, and cuts cowhides by unwonted patterns, and stitches them together into one continuous all-including Case, the farewell service of his awl! Stitch away, thou noble Fox: every prick of that little instrument is pricking into the heart of Slavery, and World-worship, and the Mammon-god. Thy elbows jerk, as in strong swimmer-strokes, and every stroke is bearing thee across the Prison-ditch, within which Vanity holds her Workhouse and Ragfair, into lands of true Liberty; were ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... rode on and on—far far over mountain and dale, over sand- hills and moor. Then Dapplegrim began to prick up his ears again, and at last he asked the lad if he ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... in a whisper to the King. "Were it not well, my liege, to send a page to the top of that sand-bank? Or would it stand with your pleasure that I prick forward? Methinks, by all yonder clash and clang, if there be no more than five hundred men beyond the sand-hills, half of the Soldan's retinue must be drummers and cymbal-tossers. Shall ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... was unpacking her box at 14 Palace Gardens. No sharpness, no slight now could prick her spirit; she had learned too well; she would ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson
... present at the second interview between Mr. Chelm and Mr. Prime, for several reasons. I was curious to have another look at my beneficiary, and I had an impression that Mr. Chelm might feel his legal conscience prick him, and so spoil the plot, if I were not within earshot. When the interview took place, however, the lawyer took a mild revenge by toying with his visitor a little at first, as though about to give an unfavorable answer; and I shall ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant


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