# jack

Pronunciation: US/AUS say "JAK" /d͡ʒæk/; UK

## Noun

1. A socket into which a plug fits to connect a device to a circuit, network, or the like.
   - Simple: A place on a wall or a device where you plug in a cord to connect something.
   - _The modem connects to the phone jack beside the desk._
   - _Newer phones dropped the headphone jack, so she bought wireless earbuds._
2. A mechanical device for lifting a heavy object and holding it up for a time, now especially one used to raise one side of a car to change a tire.
   - Simple: A tool for lifting something heavy and holding it up, like a car when you change a tire.
   - _He set the jack under the frame and cranked until the wheel cleared the ground._
   - _Movers used hydraulic jacks to raise the old house off its foundation._
3. The lowest of the court cards in a standard deck, ranking between the ten and the queen and showing a page or young servant.
   - Simple: A playing card with a picture of a young man on it, worth more than a ten but less than a queen.
   - _She laid down a pair of jacks and took the pot._
   - _The jack of diamonds was the only card he needed to finish the run._
6. A softened slang word for nothing at all, used in place of jack shit. *(slang)*
   - Simple: A slang word for nothing, used instead of a rude word.
   - _Three hours of meetings, and we still haven't decided jack._
   - _He talks big about cars, but he doesn't know jack about engines._
9. A small flag flown at the bow of a ship, used as a signal or to identify the vessel.
   - Simple: A small flag flown at the front of a ship, used as a signal or to show which ship it is.
   - _Sailors hoisted the jack at the bow as the ship dropped anchor._
   - _From the pier we could see the jack snapping in the wind above the bow._
10. A man or fellow, especially an ordinary or typical one; used as a name for any man.
   - Simple: Any ordinary man, or a name used for a man in general.
   - _Every Jack and Jill in the county turned out for the fair._
   - _When a stranger cut in front of him at the gas pump, my uncle rolled down his window and shouted, 'Hey, Jack, wait your turn!'_
11. The edible fruit of an Asian tree, Artocarpus heterophyllus, or the tree that bears it.
   - Simple: A fruit that grows on a tree in Asia, or the tree itself.
   - _The market stall sold slices of ripe jack by the pound._
   - _The temple doors were carved from old jack wood._
15. A small playing piece with six points, used in the game of jacks.
   - Simple: A small piece with six points that you pick up when playing the game of jacks.
   - _She scattered the jacks across the sidewalk and bounced the ball._
   - _One jack rolled under the couch, and we spent ten minutes looking for it._
13. Strong alcoholic liquor, especially one that is homemade or made illegally. *(Canada, US)*
   - Simple: Strong alcohol, especially the kind people make at home or against the law.
   - _During Prohibition, a quart of jack could be bought from a man behind the feed store._
   - _The prisoners fermented a batch of raisin jack from smuggled fruit and sugar._
14. Any of the various sea fish that belong to the family Carangidae.
   - Simple: Any of a family of fish that live in the sea.
   - _A school of jacks flashed silver as it tore through the baitfish._
   - _He landed a big jack on light tackle just outside the reef._
16. A jackrabbit, the long-eared hare of North America. *(US)*
   - Simple: A jackrabbit, a wild animal like a big rabbit with long ears.
   - _A big jack burst out of the sagebrush and zigzagged away._
   - _Coyotes hunt the jacks that feed along the edges of the alfalfa fields._
17. A device that grips a boot by the heel to help the wearer pull it off.
   - Simple: A tool that holds your boot at the heel so you can pull your foot out.
   - _Without a boot jack, he had to sit on the floor and wrestle his wet riding boots off by hand._
   - _She keeps a folding boot jack in her truck so she can slip out of her tall rubber boots after a muddy day at the farm._
18. A home run in baseball. *(slang)*
   - Simple: In baseball, a home run, a hit that lets the batter go around all the bases and score.
   - _He hit his third jack of the series in the eighth inning._
   - _The rookie leads the team with twelve jacks._
20. The small, usually white ball that players aim at in the game of bowls, or lawn bowling.
   - Simple: The small ball, usually white, that players try to get their balls close to in bowls.
   - _Her last bowl curled in and came to rest touching the jack._
   - _At the start of each end, one player rolls the jack down the green._
21. A man who serves as a sailor. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: A man who works on a ship as a sailor.
   - _In his letters home, the young jack complained about hard biscuits, cold night watches, and the bosun's constant shouting._
   - _A couple of jacks on shore leave wandered into the bar still in uniform._
22. A police officer or detective, or, in Australia, a military police officer. *(slang)*
   - Simple: A police officer or detective, or in Australia, a police officer in the military.
   - _He'd been a jack for thirty years and could smell a lie across the room._
   - _Two jacks picked him up outside the pub and marched him back to barracks._
23. Money or cash. *(slang, US)*
   - Simple: Money.
   - _That new truck must have cost him serious jack._
   - _She's been saving every bit of jack she earns for a trip to Japan._
24. A male ass or donkey, especially one kept for breeding. *(US)*
   - Simple: A male donkey, especially one that farmers keep for breeding.
   - _Mule breeders pay well for a tall, sound jack to put with their mares._
   - _The ranch keeps two jacks and a dozen jennies in the lower pasture._
27. A pike, especially a young one.
   - Simple: A pike (a kind of fish), especially a young one.
   - _Most of the pike we landed were jacks, too small to keep._
   - _A young jack shot out of the lily pads and grabbed the spinner with its needle-sharp teeth._

## Verb

4. To raise or increase something, such as a price, a level, or a number. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To make something higher or bigger, like a price or a number.
   - _Every spring, the landlord threatens to jack the rent up by another hundred dollars a month._
   - _Right before the holiday rush, the airline jacked up its fares by almost forty percent._
5. To raise something, such as a vehicle, using a jack.
   - Simple: To lift something heavy, like a car, using a jack.
   - _You'll need to jack the trailer before you can swap the wheel._
   - _The crew jacked the old cabin up onto steel beams._
7. To steal something, usually a car, or to rob someone. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To steal something, often a car, or to rob a person.
   - _Somebody jacked his bike while he was inside the store._
   - _Two guys tried to jack him for his phone outside the station._
8. To masturbate; the same as jack off. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To touch your own sex organs for pleasure.
   - _In the locker room, the guys swapped crude jokes about how often they used to jack off back in high school._
   - _In the movie's most cringeworthy scene, his mom opens the door just as he starts jacking it under the covers._
12. To jerk or move with jerks; also, to move something or remove it. *(colloquial)*
   - Simple: To move with a sudden pull, or to move or take something away.
   - _Every time you jack a shell into the chamber, the empty one flies out._
   - _Before stepping into the dark barn, the deputy jacked a cartridge into his rifle and switched on his flashlight._
19. In baseball, to hit a pitch very hard, especially far enough to clear the fence for a home run. *(slang)*
   - Simple: In baseball, to hit the ball very hard, especially over the fence for a home run.
   - _With two runners on, he jacked a fastball into the upper deck to tie the game._
   - _Hitters who try to jack every pitch usually end up striking out._
25. To strengthen an alcoholic drink, much as distilling would, by chilling it below water's freezing point and removing the ice that forms, leaving the still-liquid alcoholic part.
   - Simple: To make a drink like cider stronger by freezing it and taking out the ice.
   - _Each winter he jacked a barrel of hard cider in the shed, skimming off the ice every morning._
   - _In colonial New England, farmers would jack their hard cider by leaving it out in the winter cold and skimming off the ice that formed._

## Adjective

26. Weary and disillusioned, or fed up with someone or something. *(Australia)*
   - Simple: Tired, unhappy, and fed up with someone or something.
   - _By the end of the season, the shearers were jack of the boss and his broken promises._
   - _Mate, I'm jack of waiting, so let's just go._

## Other meanings

- (verb) To dance with a wavelike forward-and-back motion of the upper body.
- (noun) In a harpsichord or the earlier virginal, any of the upright wooden blocks that pass a key's movement to the quill plucking the string; also, at times, a modern piano's hopper.
- (noun) A rough protective jacket worn as armor in the Middle Ages, often made of leather or padded cloth.
- (noun) A worker who does physical, hands-on labor.
- (noun) A person whose job is cutting down trees for timber.
- (noun) An Indian soldier who served in the British colonial army.
- (noun) A mechanism that rotates a roasting spit, sometimes driven by rising smoke in a chimney.
- (noun) A tong-like hand tool that glassblowers use to shape bottles, drinking glasses and similar objects.
- (noun) A frame that holds a piece of wood steady while it is being sawed.
- (noun) In a stocking frame or knitting machine, any of the small levers that lift and drop the sinkers, which press each loop onto its needle.
- (noun) A wedge driven in to split apart rock that has been cracked by an explosion.
- (noun) A comb-like frame on a warping machine through which the threads pass so they stay apart and run straight.
- (noun) In yarn making, a machine that twists the loose strand of fiber coming off a carding machine.
- (noun) A jug or similar container for drinks, especially beer, often made of leather coated with tar.
- (noun) A liquid measure that equals one fourth of a pint.
- (noun) An imitation of a British gold sovereign, such as the brass tokens of the 1800s that were sometimes passed off as the real coin.
- (noun) An iron crosspiece fitted near the top of a ship's topgallant mast to spread the rigging.
- (noun) A lamp or torch used when hunting at night to draw or blind animals.
- (noun) In cricket, the batter who goes in last, eleventh in the order.
- (noun) A large, smooth, often egg-shaped stone found in a stream or riverbed.
- (noun) Another name for the bocaccio (Sebastes paucispinis), a big rockfish caught off the Pacific coast of California.
- (noun) Any member of the plant genus Arisaema, such as the jack-in-the-pulpit, which bears its flower spike inside a hooded sheath.
- (noun) The fleshy flower spike at the center of an arum-type plant such as jack-in-the-pulpit.
- (noun) Any of the weedy Emex plants, whose hard fruits carry three sharp spines, as in three-corner jack.
- (verb) To take part in a fight or brawl.
- (noun) A Southeast Asian tree, Mangifera caesia, closely related to the mango, that bears white-fleshed fruit.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–10, 12–17, 20–27** — The man's name Jack was put to wider use. In cricket, calling the eleventh batsman this refers to the card jack, which comes after the 10.
**Meaning 11** — From Portuguese jaca (“jackfruit”), from Malayalam ചക്ക (cakka).

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