yoked

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of yoke.

   She yoked the mule to the plow and started down the first row.

   The treaty yoked two old rivals into an uneasy alliance.

   Note

   The simple past and the participle share this spelling: she yoked the mule to the plow; two rivals were yoked into an uneasy alliance. The word after the verb does the sorting: to names what something is fastened to, while together joins two things, often in a pairing nobody chose. Before a noun the form settles into the adjective for wearing a yoke, as in a yoked ox.

2. 2
   adjective

   Wearing a yoke, the frame that joins draft animals so they can pull a cart or plow.

   A pair of yoked oxen hauled logs down to the river.

   Tourists photographed the yoked water buffalo as they plowed the paddy.

   Note

   The working picture the other uses grow from: a pair of oxen or buffalo joined at the neck by one frame, pulling a cart or plow together. As an adjective it stands before its noun (yoked oxen, a yoked team) and has no comparative. Out of that picture come the subjugated meaning and the joking word for married.

3. 3
   adjective

   Having large, well-defined muscles, especially in the neck and trapezius area that together form the "yoke".

   He came back from the off-season yoked, his traps rising almost to his ears.

   The wrestler looked yoked in his new promo photos.

   Similarjacked, ripped, swole, buff, muscular

   Oppositescrawny, puny

   Note

   Gym talk calls the ridge of muscle where the neck meets the shoulders, built mostly from the trapezius, the yoke, and someone yoked has that ridge standing out. Casual praise stretches it to a muscular build in general, as in Star Trek: Lower Decks (2021): fine commander, so yoked. It usually follows be, get or so rather than standing before a noun.

4. 4
   adjectivefiguratively

   Brought under someone's control and kept in submission.

   The pamphlet called on yoked workers everywhere to throw off their chains.

   For centuries the yoked peasantry paid rent and labor to distant landlords.

   Similaroppressed, downtrodden

   Oppositefree, liberated

5. 5
   adjectiveslang

   Joined in marriage; married.

   Half my college friends got yoked the same year, so I spent every weekend at weddings.

   He's been yoked for a decade and still talks about his wife like they just met.

   Similarmarried

   Oppositesingle, unmarried

   Note

   The joke is that married life means pulling one load in step with someone else for good. The word comes with get or be (they got yoked four years ago; he's been yoked for a decade), and it belongs to slang: affectionate among friends, far too casual for a wedding invitation or a formal announcement.

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