Inherited from Middle English bukke. Doublet of puck (“billy goat”). Currency-related senses hail from American English, a clipping of buckskin as a unit of trade among Indians and Europeans in frontier days (attested from 1748). The idea of rigidly standing implements is instilled by Dutch bok (“sawhorse”) as in zaagbok (“sawbuck”). The sense of an object indicating someone’s turn then occurred in American English, possibly originating from the game poker, where a knife (typically with a hilt made from a stag horn) was used as a place-marker to signify whose turn it was to deal. The place-marker was commonly referred to as a buck, which reinforced the term “pass the buck” used in poker, and eventually a silver dollar was used in place of a knife, which also led to a dollar being referred to as a buck.
Africa An antelope of either sex; compare with Afrikaans bok.
There are all kinds of game in the valley, and you are unlucky if you do not see a giraffe or an ostrich, or at least a herd of buck.1950 April, Timothy H. Cobb, “The Kenya-Uganda Railway”, in Railway Magazine, pages 265-266:
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The sound made by a chicken.
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A young buck; an adventurous, impetuous, dashing, or high-spirited young man.
Swankey of the Body Guard himself, that dangerous youth, and the greatest buck of all the Indian army now on leave, was one day discovered by Major Dobbin tête-à-tête with Amelia, and describing the sport of pig-sticking to her with great humour and eloquence […]1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 60, in Vanity Fair:
This pusillanimous creature thinks himself, and would be thought, a buck.1808, Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Connoisseur: The British Essayists, volume 32, page 93:
The Captain was then a buck and dandy, during the reign of those two successive dynasties, of the first rank of the second order ; the characteristic of which very respectable rank of fashionables I hold to be, that their spurs impinge upon the pavement oftener than upon the sides of a horse.1825, Constantine Henry Phipps, I Zingari: The English in Italy, volume II, page 153:
As we crossed Blackwell's Island a limousine passed us, driven by a white chauffeur, in which sat three modish negroes, two bucks and a girl.1925, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, page 83:
But this buck claimed he was a big war chief with the Nawyecky Comanches.1956, Frank S. Nugent, Alan Le May, The Searchers, spoken by Futterman:
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She got so she’d rather have a buck nigger than me!1979, Octavia Butler, Kindred:
Her curly red hair loose from its combs hangin' down her back and her freckled skin bare, and a big ole nigger buck was doin' things to her! He'd always known that Hootch Carter raped and killed Becky Nell, never had reason to doubt it.2009, Carol C. Morgan, Wind in the Cotton Fields, page 460:
‘A couple of Old Men wanted that young lubra and they’ve spurred on the bucks to chase Possum and cut his liver out.’1937, Ion L. Idriess, Over the Range, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, published 1947, page 44:
Those fools are all probably sitting outside the pork store, recalling the incident about losing a thousand bucks with the fake Gajas, and chewing on their soggy stogies.2010 December 14, Robert Hernandez, Slurp:Killer Wine, page 129:
He loaded the shotgun with two rounds of double-ought buck.
› An implement the body of which is likened to…
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UK, Dialectal The body of a post mill, particularly in East Anglia. See Wikipedia:Windmill machinery.
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A frame on which firewood is sawed; a sawhorse; a sawbuck.
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A leather-covered frame used for gymnastic vaulting.
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A wood or metal frame used by automotive customizers and restorers to assist in the shaping of sheet metal bodywork.
Plans in hand, Frank first paid his friend Raniero a visit, and the artisan quickly went to work on a fortified wood buck that would serve as a form for the Griffith 600 Series, as the car was formally known and marketed by Griffith Motors.2010, Andrew McCredie, Paula Reisner, Intermeccanica: The Story of the Prancing Bull, page 58:
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Dated An object of various types, placed on a table to indicate turn or status; such as a brass object, placed in rotation on a US Navy wardroom dining table to indicate which officer is to be served first, or an item passed around a poker table indicating the dealer or placed in the pot to remind the winner of some privilege or obligation when his or her turn to deal next comes.
› An implement the body of which is likened to… › An object of various types, placed on a…
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Broadly, Dated, In certain metaphors or phrases, In the US Blame; responsibility; scapegoating; finger-pointing.
Inherited from Middle English bukke. Doublet of puck (“billy goat”). Currency-related senses hail from American English, a clipping of buckskin as a unit of trade among Indians and Europeans in frontier days (attested from 1748). The idea of rigidly standing implements is instilled by Dutch bok (“sawhorse”) as in zaagbok (“sawbuck”). The sense of an object indicating someone’s turn then occurred in American English, possibly originating from the game poker, where a knife (typically with a hilt made from a stag horn) was used as a place-marker to signify whose turn it was to deal. The place-marker was commonly referred to as a buck, which reinforced the term “pass the buck” used in poker, and eventually a silver dollar was used in place of a knife, which also led to a dollar being referred to as a buck.
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To copulate, as bucks and does.
buck
verb
Etymology From dialectal buck ("to give in, yield"; also bug (“to bend”)), from Middle Low German bucken (“to bend”) or Middle Dutch bucken, bocken (“to bend”), ultimately from Proto-West Germanic *bukkōn (“to bend, bend repeatedly”), from Proto-Germanic *bukkōną (“to bend”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰugʰ-, *bʰewgʰ- (“to bend”) + Proto-Germanic *-(u)kōną. Cognate with Old Frisian bukkia (“to bend”). Influenced in some senses by buck “male goat” (see above). Sense “to meet, to encounter” is a semantic loan from Jamaican Creole buck. Compare bow and elbow.
To leap upward arching its back, coming down with head low and forelegs stiff, forcefully kicking its hind legs upward, often in an attempt to dislodge or throw a rider or pack.
Of a horse or similar saddle or pack animal
1849, Jackey Jackey, The Statement of the Aboriginal Native Jackey Jackey, who Accompanied Mr. Kennedy, William Carron, Narrative of an Expedition Undertaken Under the Direction of the Late Mr. Assistant Surveyor E. B. Kennedy, 2004 Gutenberg Australia eBook #0201121, At the same time we got speared, the horses got speared too, and jumped and bucked all about, and got into the swamp.
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To throw (a rider or pack) by bucking.
Of a horse or similar saddle or pack animal
The brute that he was riding had nearly bucked him out of the saddle.1886, W. E. Norris, A Bachelor's Blunder:
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Broadly To resist obstinately; oppose or object strongly.
The vice president bucked at the board’s latest solution.
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Broadly To move or operate in a sharp, jerking, or uneven manner.
The motor bucked and sputtered before dying completely.
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Broadly To overcome or shed (e.g., an impediment or expectation), in pursuit of a goal; to force a way through despite (an obstacle); to resist or proceed against.
The plane bucked a strong headwind.
Our managers have to learn to buck the trend and do the right thing for their employees.
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John is really bucking the odds on that risky business venture. He's doing quite well.
I spoke to him in London recently and suggested he was bucking an age-old system. Surely popular performers studied the possible reactions of their audience in advance when deciding on a new approach?1977 November 20, Dave Gelly, “No more Ziggy as David Bowie becomes his own man”, in The Observer:
1977-1980, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure [I] Asked if he wanted to go to a punk rock concert Saturday & he had another engagement but he would buck it because it sure sounded much more fun going with me.
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Government, Military, Politics, War To subject to a mode of punishment which consists of tying the wrists together, passing the arms over the bent knees, and putting a stick across the arms and in the angle formed by the knees.
Arts, Business, Construction, Crafts, Engineering, Hobbies, Lifestyle, Manufacturing, Metallurgy, Metalworking, Natural sciences, Physical sciences To press a heavy, shaped bucking bar against the bucktail of a rivet, while the opposite end (the rivet factory head) is hammered by a rivet gun, to upset the bucktail into an appropriate shape, most commonly a pancake-shape.
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Business, Forestry To saw a felled tree into shorter lengths, as for firewood.
Well he yoked the ass up to the cart. And then the holy ructions it did start. Well he bucked it in the air and he bucked it all around. Till he smashed the buckin' cart upon the ground.1997 February 20, “Mickey's buckin' ass”performed by Richie Kavanagh:
Thatch had come down the stairs and chimed in: "Isn't he an awful buckin' eejit?"2003, Sam Stewart, The Druid, page 195:
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"Was he a buccaneer?" I asked. "No, eejit!" Lionel said. Never one to pass up a play on words, he continued, "He's a buckin' IRA man and he's gathering up an army in the Irish Free State. He says he's going to march up to Ulster and drive all of us Protestants into the Irish Sea!"2010, The Other Belfast, page 155:
"I can see the headlines in the morning, taxi man bucking hangs himself.2012 January 28, 20:01 from the start, in Mrs Brown's Boys (Mammy's Going) (2), episode 5, spoken by Agnes Brown (Brendan O'Carroll):
I will buck a French lad, Erin. I will buck a French lad, so help me God.2018 January 11, 13:39 from the start, in Derry Girls (1), episode 2, spoken by Michelle Mallon (Jamie-Lee O'Donnell):
Protestors chanted "You're not wanted here" and held up placards with slogans such as "Buck off" - a pun on Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck's name - and "No to racist Ricketts".2022 April 2, Emma Smith, “Watch: 'Buck off!' - Chelsea fans stage 'No to racist Ricketts' ownership protest outside Stamford Bridge”, in goal.com:
There is in it also woodes of buck, and deir in them.1777, Mostyn John Armstrong, A Scotch Atlas; Or Description of the Kingdom of Scotland:
But, whilst we thus condemn the timber, we must not omit to praise the mast, which fats our swine and deer, and hath, in some families, even supported men with bread. Chios endured a memorable siege by the beniefit of this mast. And, in some parts of France, they now grind the buck in mills; it affords a sweet oil, which the poor people east most willingly.1786, John Evelyn, Alexander Hunter, Silva: Or, A Discourse Of Forest-Trees, page 136:
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The HORNBEAM ( provincially “HORSE-BEECH," in contradistinction to “buck beech” — the true beech) is, in many woods, the most prevalent species; and being drawn up in thickets with a rapid growth, becomes tall and straight enough for hop poles: and is even suffered to grow up, as a species of wood timber.1798, William Marshall, The Rural Economy of the Southern Counties:
The magnolia, buck [ beech?], and poplar never grow on lands subject to overflow.1969, Samuel Henry Lockett, Lauren C. Post, Louisiana as it is, page 53:
The underbrush is all there, spice brush, buck beech, iron wood and alder and no doubt in the spring of the year, there is a wealth of flowers.2010, Joel Greenberg, Of Prairie, Woods, and Water:
Etymology From Middle English bouken (“steep in lye”), ultimately related to the root of beech. Cognate with Middle High German büchen, Swedish byka, Danish byge and Low German būken.
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Archaic Lye or suds in which cloth is soaked in the operation of bleaching, or in which clothes are washed.
1673, Robert Almond, The English Horseman and Complete Farrier, London: Simon Miller, Chapter 25 “Maunginess in the Main,” p. 236, […] when you find the scurf to fall off, wash the Neck and other parts with Buck Lye made blood warm.
Buck! I would I could wash myself of the buck!c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iii]:
Etymology From Middle English bouken (“steep in lye”), ultimately related to the root of beech. Cognate with Middle High German büchen, Swedish byka, Danish byge and Low German būken.
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Archaic To soak, steep or boil in lye or suds, as part of the bleaching process.
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Archaic To wash (clothes) in lye or suds, or, in later usage, by beating them on stones in running water
This [ore mixture] was bucked or cobbed down to a 'peasy' size (i.e. the size of a pea) or less, using a flat-bottomed bucking hammer, and then riddled into coarse peasy and finer (sand-sized) 'smitham' grades.1991, Joan Day, R. F. Tylecote, The industrial revolution in metals, page 89:
buck
noun
Etymology From Middle English bouk (“belly, trunk, body, hull of a ship, fishtrap, container”), from Old English būc (“belly, bottle, jug, pitcher”), from Proto-West Germanic *būk, from Proto-Germanic *būkaz. Doublet of bucket.
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UK, Archaic, Dialectal The body of a cart or waggon, especially the front part.
Etymology From Middle English bouk (“belly, trunk, body, hull of a ship, fishtrap, container”), from Old English būc (“belly, bottle, jug, pitcher”), from Proto-West Germanic *būk, from Proto-Germanic *būkaz. Doublet of bucket.
And then […] he bucks with a quiet stubborn determination that would fill an American editor, or an Under Secretary of State with despair. He belongs to the 12-foot-tiger school, so perhaps he can't help it.1880, Ali Baba (page 164)
He was certainly bucking about his trophies, and for the sake of the argument you will be good enough to admit that you probably bucked about yours. What happens? You are overheard; you are followed; you are worked into the same scheme, and robbed on the same night.1905, E. W. Hornung, A Thief in the Night: