quick

Less common meanings

6. 6
   under the nailsnoun

   The raw, sensitive flesh beneath the fingernails and toenails.

   Trimming too close to the quick can make the toe bleed.

   The groomer was careful not to clip the quick of the dog's claw.

   UsageUsually the quick: she cut her nails to the quick.

7. 7
   short-temperedadjective

   Easily aroused to anger; quick-tempered.

   Quick to anger, he slammed the door at the slightest annoyance.

   Her quick temper made the staff careful with their words.

   UsageUsually a quick temper or quick-tempered.

   Similarshort, hot, fiery, hasty

   Oppositepatient, calm, even

   Note

   It applies to people or to their tempers, and the constructions vary: a quick temper, quick of temper, and, in Hugh Latimer's sermon of 1549, quick with someone. In an anecdote he tells, a visiting bishop "was somewhat quick with them", meaning short and sharp toward them. That last pattern names the target of the anger, which the other two cannot do. Source

   Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 3 facts

   • The quoted use occurs in a sermon by Hugh Latimer delivered in 1549. anglicanhistory.org
   • Latimer's anecdote concerns a bishop making a visitation. anglicanhistory.org
   • Latimer describes the bishop as somewhat quick with them; the context confirms that the bishop was offended and treated them sharply. anglicanhistory.org
8. 8
   tender corenoun

   The most vital or sensitive part, where injury or feeling cuts deepest.

   The public insult wounded the old soldier to the quick.

   Her mentor's cold dismissal cut her to the quick.

   UsageUsed in cut someone to the quick, meaning hurt their feelings deeply.

   Similarcore, heart, bone

   Note

   Old writers aimed it at arguments as well as bodies. Hugh Latimer said in 1550 that a text "toucheth the quick". Thomas Fuller in 1655 spoke of "the quick of the difference", the real crux of a dispute. Theodore Roethke's "we leave the quick" uses it for life itself. Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

   • Hugh Latimer said in a 1550 sermon that a text 'toucheth the quick'. anglicanhistory.org
   • Thomas Fuller's cited work was published in 1655. archive.org
   • Fuller used 'the quick of the difference' for the central point of a dispute. en.wiktionary.org
   • Theodore Roethke wrote 'we leave the quick', using 'quick' for life, in 'Prognosis'. en.wiktionary.org
9. 9
   living peoplenounarchaicwith the

   Those who are alive; the living.

   Every Sunday the congregation recited the old creed, which speaks of judging the quick and the dead.

   She imagined spirits wandering unseen among the quick.

   Similarliving

   Oppositedead, deceased, departed

   Note

   The definite article is obligatory, and the sense is plural: the quick are those who are alive. Its home is the pairing the quick and the dead, which the King James Bible of 1611 already uses ("iudge the quicke and the dead"). Against it stand the dead or, more politely, the deceased and the departed. Source

   Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 2 facts

   • The pairing occurs in the King James Bible, first published in 1611. en.wikipedia.org
   • The quoted spelling and wording occur in 2 Timothy 4:1 in the 1611 Bible. en.wiktionary.org
10. 10
    aliveadjectivearchaic

    Living; having life rather than being dead.

    Man is no star, but a quick coal / Of mortal fire.

    1633, George Herbert, The Temple

    The inmost oratory of my soul, Wherein thou ever dwellest quick or dead, Is black with grief eternal for thy sake.

    1874, James Thomson, The City of Dreadful Night

    Note

    Here is the word's original meaning: Old English cwic, "alive", from an Indo-European root meaning "to live". Speed, wit and sharpness all branch from it. The sense is archaic now, but poets kept it alive. George Herbert has man as "a quick coal / Of mortal fire" in 1633, and James Thomson still writes "quick or dead" in 1874. Use it today only for a deliberately old-fashioned effect. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 7 facts

    • Quick descends from Old English cwic, meaning alive, ultimately from an Indo-European root meaning to live. en.wiktionary.org
    • The ultimate Indo-European root means to live. en.wiktionary.org
    • The senses involving speed, wit and sharpness belong to the same inherited word and its semantic development. en.wiktionary.org
    • George Herbert describes man as a quick coal of mortal fire in Employment (II), in The Temple; the quotation modernizes spelling. ccel.org
    • Herbert's quotation was first published in The Temple in 1633. university-collections.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk
    • James Thomson uses quick or dead in section X of The City of Dreadful Night, in a young man's speech. gutenberg.org
    • Thomson's poem was first published in 1874. en.wikipedia.org
11. 11
    fast bowlernouncountable

    In cricket, a fast bowler who relies on the speed of delivery.

    The captain opened the attack with his most hostile quick.

    Australia's lineup featured three genuine quicks.

    UsageThe plural is quicks: a side with three quicks.

    Similarpaceman, speedster

    Oppositespinner

    Note

    Cricket turned the adjective of speed, the "fast-moving" sense, into a noun for the bowler.

12. 12
    simple cluesadjective

    In crosswords, using straightforward clues rather than cryptic ones.

    Beginners often start with the quick crossword before trying cryptics.

    A quick clue gives a direct definition rather than wordplay.

    Oppositecryptic

    Note

    Crossword solvers use the word as a label for a type of puzzle, the counterpart of cryptic. A quick clue asks only for the answer to a plain definition, with no hidden wordplay. The name points to the style of clue, not to solving time. A quick puzzle can still be hard, and a hard one is not thereby cryptic.

13. 13
    unstable clayadjective

    Of a sensitive glaciomarine clay: liable to lose its strength suddenly and flow like a liquid when disturbed.

    Much of the valley sits on quick clay, which can turn to liquid without warning when the ground is disturbed.

    Engineers avoided the site because the soil there was quick and prone to sudden collapse.

    Note

    Engineers meet it in the term quick clay. Engineering Geophysics (2022), edited by Anna Bondo Medhus and Lone Klinkby, explains how it forms: glaciomarine clay turns quick after fresh ground- and rainwater leach the salt from its pore water. Its contributors also draw a useful line. Every quick clay is brittle, yet brittleness alone does not make a clay quick. Source

    Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

    • Engineering Geophysics was published in 2022 and edited by Anna Bondo Medhus and Lone Klinkby. ucviden.dk
    • The book explains that glaciomarine clay becomes quick through extensive groundwater and rainwater leaching. en.wiktionary.org
    • Fresh water removes salt from the clay, changing its strength characteristics. inte.ngi.no
    • The book states that every quick clay is brittle, while some brittle clay is not quick. en.wiktionary.org
14. 14
    moving (unborn)adjectivearchaic

    Of a fetus, at the stage when its movements can be felt; of a woman, pregnant, especially at this stage.

    Note

    Law has kept this archaic sense in working order. Singapore's Penal Code (2008 edition) still speaks of causing "the death of a quick unborn child". There the word describes the child. Said of a woman, it means she is pregnant and can feel the child move. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts

    • Singapore's Penal Code has a 2008 edition. upload.wikimedia.org
    • That edition contains the exact words 'the death of a quick unborn child'. upload.wikimedia.org
    • In the statutory wording, 'quick' describes the unborn child. upload.wikimedia.org
    • Applied to a woman, 'quick' can describe pregnancy at the stage when fetal movements can be felt. en.wiktionary.org
15. 15
    flowing (water)adjectivearchaic

    Of water: flowing and fresh rather than still or stagnant.

    Note

    Water was called quick the way a creature was: alive, the meaning behind the archaic "living" sense. Moving water counted as living water, and still, stagnant water as its opposite. The use is archaic. In modern writing a quick stream is likely to be heard as merely fast, so the context has to make the "flowing" meaning clear. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 2 facts

    • Quick water was understood as living water: flowing water contrasted with standing or stagnant water. sermonindex.net
    • The flowing-water sense is archaic. en.wiktionary.org
16. 16
    hedge plantsnoununcountable

    Young living plants, especially hawthorn, used to form a quickset hedge.

    Similarhawthorn

    Note

    A hedge of quick is a hedge of living plants. The word's old meaning of "alive", seen in the archaic "living" sense, is here applied to shrubs set in the ground. It works as a mass noun. John Evelyn's diary of 1641 describes works "curiously hedged with quick", with no article and no plural. Quickset carries the same idea: plants set while alive. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 5 facts

    • Quick denotes plants used to make a hedge. en.wiktionary.org
    • Quick has an archaic meaning of alive or living. en.wiktionary.org
    • The hedging term applies the living sense of quick to planted shrubs. en.wikipedia.org
    • Evelyn's diary entry for September 1641 contains the quoted wording, using quick without an article or plural ending. gutenberg.org
    • Quickset refers to living planting material set in the ground to grow. en.wiktionary.org
17. 17
    creeping grassnoununcountable

    Couch grass; a persistent creeping grass that spreads through tough underground stems.

    The whole bed was choked with quick by midsummer.

    He spent the afternoon digging quick out of the vegetable patch.

    Similarcouch

    Note

    Gardeners know it as a weed that spreads by tough underground stems and is hard to root out. Do not confuse it with the hedging-plant sense, living shrubs set in a hedge. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts

    • Gardeners regard couch grass as a weed that spreads through underground stems. rhs.org.uk
    • Couch grass has wiry underground growth, supporting the description as tough. rhs.org.uk
    • Established couch grass is difficult to eradicate. gardenorganic.org.uk
    • The hedging-plant sense of quick is distinct from its couch-grass sense. en.wiktionary.org
18. 18
    burningadjectivearchaic

    Burning, fiery, or readily flammable.

    Note

    Fire counts as life here: what burns is quick in the way a living thing is. The sense is archaic, though E. R. Eddison revives it in The Worm Ouroboros (1922), where "the night was quick with fiery signs". That with-construction is shared by the "pregnant" meaning, so in such lines burning and teeming can blur together. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 5 facts

    • Quick has an archaic sense meaning burning, flammable, or fiery. en.wiktionary.org
    • E. R. Eddison wrote The Worm Ouroboros. en.wikisource.org
    • The Worm Ouroboros was first published in 1922. en.wikisource.org
    • The quoted wording occurs in the novel, spoken by Lord Gro to Corund while recounting a dream. en.wikisource.org
    • The figurative pregnant sense also permits the construction quick with. en.wiktionary.org
19. 19
    bring to lifeverbarchaictransitive

    To give life to something, or to rouse it into motion and activity.

    I rose as if quicked by a spur I was bound to obey.

    1917, Thomas Hardy, At the Word ‘Farewell’

    Note

    Thomas Hardy reaches for it in 1917: "I rose as if quicked by a spur I was bound to obey." The verb is archaic and poetic, and quicken now does the same work. Using quick as a verb therefore reads as a deliberate choice. Its forms are regular: quicks, quicking, quicked. Source

    Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

    • The Hardy passage was published in 1917, in Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses. gutenberg.org
    • Hardy wrote the quoted words in “At the Word ‘Farewell’”; they describe the poem's first-person narrator. gutenberg.org
20. 20
    adjectiveobsolete

    Fresh, bracing, sharp, or keen: stimulating to the senses.

    Note

    Air and weather are what this obsolete sense described: a sharpness that wakes the body and the appetite. In a play Shakespeare wrote around 1607–1608, "the ayre is quicke there, / And it perces and sharpens the stomacke." Because the sense is gone, a modern reader will hear quick air as fast-moving air. Fresh, bracing or keen now do this work. Source

    Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts

    • Quick had an obsolete sense meaning fresh, bracing, sharp or keen, illustrated by its application to air. en.wiktionary.org
    • The play containing the quotation, Pericles, was written by Shakespeare around 1607–1608. This is a composition date; first publication was in 1609. folgerpedia.folger.edu
    • The quoted wording occurs in Pericles, Act IV, scene i. en.wiktionary.org
    • The quotation is dialogue spoken by Dionyza. folger.edu
21. 21
    mercury coatverbtransitive

    To prepare a metal surface for gilding or silvering by dipping it in a solution of mercury and nitric acid so the coating will hold.
22. 22
    adjective

    Of a vein of ore: productive, yielding ore rather than being dead or barren.