# deck

Pronunciation: say "DEK" /dɛk/

## Noun

1. A floorlike platform extending across the hull of a ship or boat; small craft usually have one, larger vessels several.
   - Simple: A floor on a ship or boat. Small boats have one, and big ships have several.
   - _We stood on the upper deck as the ferry crossed the harbor._
   - _Waves swept across the deck during the storm, and the crew clipped on safety lines._
2. Any raised, level platform built to be walked on, such as a balcony, porch, raised patio, or flat rooftop.
   - Simple: A raised flat area where people can walk or sit, like a porch or balcony.
   - _They built a cedar deck off the kitchen last summer._
   - _Guests gathered on the rooftop deck to watch the fireworks._
3. A pack or complete set of playing cards.
   - Simple: A complete set of playing cards used for games.
   - _He cut the deck before the dealer handed out the hands._
   - _The magician fanned the deck and asked her to pick a card._
6. Ellipsis of slide deck: a set of slides for a presentation. — Ellipsis of slide deck: a set of slides for a presentation.
   - Simple: Short for slide deck. Use it for the set of slides someone shows in a talk or meeting.
   - _The marketing team revised the deck three times before the product launch._
   - _His deck had forty slides, so the meeting ran long._
7. Ellipsis of tape deck. — Ellipsis of tape deck.
   - Simple: Short for tape deck. Use it for a machine that plays and records cassette tapes.
   - _He slid the mixtape into the deck and pressed play._
   - _The deck chewed up her favorite cassette last week._
9. The floor. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: The floor that you stand or walk on.
   - _The glass shattered and sent shards skidding across the deck._
   - _He was so exhausted after the double shift that he lay down right there on the deck._
10. A set of cards owned by an individual player, from which that player draws during play.
   - Simple: The set of cards that one player owns and draws from in a game.
   - _His deck relies on cheap creatures that can attack in the first few turns._
   - _She swapped two cards out of her deck after losing the first match._
11. The stage of a theater.
   - Simple: The stage in a theater where actors and dancers perform.
   - _Stagehands taped the set positions onto the deck during rehearsal._
   - _Nobody crosses the deck while the electricians focus the lights overhead._
12. A headline consisting of one or more full lines of text, especially a subheadline that appears below the main headline.
   - Simple: Smaller text printed under a main headline to give more detail about the story.
   - _Copy editors trimmed the deck to fit a single column on the front page._
   - _Modern news sites rely on decks to summarize articles in search results._
16. A main supporting surface of an airplane, especially one of the stacked wings of a biplane or multiplane.
   - Simple: A main wing of an airplane, especially on an old plane with two or more wings stacked above each other.
   - _Early aviators braced the upper deck to the lower one with struts and wires._
   - _The triplane's three decks gave it remarkable lift at low speeds._
17. The bottom of a river, lake, or other body of water. *(British)*
   - Simple: The ground at the bottom of a river or lake.
   - _The angler let his rig settle on the deck before tightening the line._
   - _In winter the fish sit hard on the deck and barely move._
18. A collection of cards (individual pages or forms) handled as a single unit in card-based systems such as WML or HyperCard.
   - Simple: A group of pages or screens that work together as one unit in some computer programs.
   - _The browser downloaded the entire deck, then displayed its first card._
   - _Developers split large WAP sites into small decks to fit the phones' limited memory._
19. In graph theory, the multiset of all the graphs obtained from one graph by deleting each of its vertices in turn.
   - Simple: In math, the set of smaller diagrams made by removing each point of a network, one at a time.
   - _Each graph in the deck has exactly one vertex fewer than the original._
   - _Researchers compared the decks of the two graphs to test whether they could be distinguished._
20. A small packet of folded paper in which illegal drugs are sold or passed on. *(slang)*
   - Simple: A small folded paper that holds an illegal drug.
   - _Detectives recovered forty decks of heroin stamped with the same logo._
   - _He kept a single deck tucked inside his cigarette pack._

## Verb

4. To hit someone hard enough to send them to the floor, often with just one punch. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To hit someone so hard that they fall down.
   - _The boxer decked his opponent in the first round._
   - _Insult his sister again and he'll deck you._
5. To decorate something.
   - Simple: To decorate something, for example with lights or flowers.
   - _Every winter the shop owners deck their storefronts with ribbon and evergreen branches._
   - _Volunteers decked the town square with flags for the parade._
8. To dress someone up in clothes that are finer or more elegant than usual.
   - Simple: To dress someone in very fine or fancy clothes.
   - _The stylists decked the actress in borrowed diamonds for the premiere._
   - _For the festival, families deck their children in embroidered costumes._
13. In card games, to leave an opponent with no cards left to draw, which typically costs them the game.
   - Simple: In card games, to make another player run out of cards to draw, so they usually lose.
   - _Mill strategies aim to deck the opponent rather than reduce their life total._
   - _She decked her opponent on turn twelve by forcing three extra draws each round._
14. To cover or overspread something, lying or being spread across its whole surface.
   - Simple: To cover something all over, the way flowers cover a spring field.
   - _Frost decked every branch along the river by morning._
   - _Vines deck the entire north wall of the old chapel._

## Verb

15. To furnish a ship or boat with a deck. *(rare)*
   - Simple: To build a flat covering or floor across the top of a boat.
   - _The boatbuilder decked the hull with teak planks over the summer._
   - _Some kayakers deck their canoes for rough open water._

## Noun

21. A heap of things, or a store laid up for future use. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: A pile of things, or a supply kept for later.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–4, 6–7, 9–13, 15–21** — From Middle English dekke, borrowed from Middle Dutch dec ('roof, covering'), tracing back through Old Dutch and Proto-Germanic. It is related to German Decke ('covering, blanket') and is a doublet of thatch and thack.
**Meanings 5, 8, 14** — From Middle English dekken, from Middle Dutch dekken ('to cover'), going back through Old Dutch to Proto-Germanic *þakjaną ('to roof; cover').

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/deck (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).