• (America) enPR: stärk, IPA: /stɑɹk/
• (RP) enPR: stärk, IPA: /stɑːk/

From Middle English stark, starc, from Old English stearc, starc, from Proto-West Germanic *stark, from Proto-Germanic *starkuz, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)terg-.

Cognate with Saterland Frisian sterc, Dutch sterk, Low German sterk, German stark, Danish stærk, Swedish stark, Norwegian sterk, Icelandic sterkur. Related to starch.

In the phrase stark naked: an alternation of Middle English stert naked, from stert, a literal parallel to the modern butt naked.

stark (comparative starker, superlative starkest)

1. (obsolete) Hard, firm; obdurate.
2. Severe; violent; fierce (now usually in describing the weather).
3. (poetic, literary or archaic) Strong; vigorous; powerful.
   • c. 1622, John Fletcher, Philip Massinger [et al.?], “Beggars Bush”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC ↗, Act III, scene ii:

     Stark beer, boy, stout and strong beer.

   • 1805, Walter Scott, “(please specify the page)”, in The Lay of the Last Minstrel: A Poem, London: […] [James Ballantyne] for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, […], and A[rchibald] Constable and Co., […], →OCLC ↗:

     a stark, moss-trooping Scot

4. Stiff, rigid.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC ↗, stanza 44:

     His heauie head, deuoide of carefull carke, / Whose sences all were straight benumbd and starke.

   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act V, scene iii]:

     Many a nobleman lies stark and stiff / Under the hoofs of vaunting enemies.

   • 1611, Ben[jamin] Jonson, Catiline His Conspiracy, London: […] [William Stansby?] for Walter Burre, →OCLC ↗, (please specify the page):

     The north is not so stark and cold.

5. Plain in appearance; barren, desolate.

   I picked my way forlornly through the stark, sharp rocks.

6. Naked.
   • 1817 December, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “The Revolt of Islam. […]”, in [Mary] Shelley, editor, The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. […], volume I, London: Edward Moxon […], published 1839, →OCLC ↗, page 211 ↗:

     They bore me to a cavern in the hill
     Beneath that column, and unbound me there;
     And one did strip me stark; and one did fill
     A vessel from the putrid pool; one bare
     A lighted torch, and four with friendless care
     Guided my steps the cavern-paths along […]

7. Complete, absolute, full.

   I screamed in stark terror.

   A flower was growing, in stark contrast, out of the sidewalk.

   • 1611, Ben[jamin] Jonson, Catiline His Conspiracy, London: […] [William Stansby?] for Walter Burre, →OCLC ↗, (please specify the page):

     Consider, first, the stark security / The commonwealth is in now.

   • 1689 (first published posthumously), John Selden, Table-Talk

     Rhetoric is very good or stark naught; there's no medium in rhetoric.

   • 1851 November 13, Herman Melville, chapter 17, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC ↗:

     Ramadans, and prolonged ham-squattings in cold, cheerless rooms were stark nonsense

• Italian: duro, nudo, crudo

• German: streng
• Italian: violento, furioso
• Spanish: severo, duro

• Italian: inflessibile, forte, gagliardo, robusto
• Portuguese: duradouro, vigoroso

• Italian: desolato, aspro, selvaggio

• German: steif
• Italian: rigido, stecchito
• Spanish: rígido

• German: völlig, ganz, total
• Italian: assoluto, completo, totale, bell'e buono, puro e semplice, vero e proprio
• Spanish: absoluto, completo

stark (not comparable)

1. starkly; entirely, absolutely

   He's gone stark, staring mad.

   She was just standing there, stark naked.

   • 1655, Thomas Fuller, The Church-history of Britain; […], London: […] Iohn Williams […], →OCLC ↗:

     […] held him strangled in his arms till he was stark dead.

• French: tout
• German: völlig, total
• Spanish: completamente

From Middle English starken, from Old English stearcian, from Proto-Germanic *starkōną, *starkēną ("to stiffen, become hard"), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)terg-.

stark (starks, present participle starking; simple past and past participle starked)

1. (obsolete or dialect) To stiffen.

• starkish
• starkly
• starkers

• As a Scottish and English surname, from the adjective stark.
• As a Jewish, German -, and Swedish - surname, from stark, related to the above.

• (America) IPA: /stɑɹk/

1. Surname.
2. A number of places in USA:
   1. An ucomm in Butts County, Georgia.
   2. An ucomm in Stark County, Illinois.
   3. A tiny city in Neosho County, Kansas.
   4. An ucomm in Elliott County, Kentucky.
   5. An ucomm in Pike County, Missouri.
   6. A small town in Coos County, New Hampshire.
   7. A small town in Herkimer County, New York, named after John Stark.
   8. An ucomm in Boone County, West Virginia.
   9. A small town in Vernon County, Wisconsin.

stark (uncountable)

1. (fiction) The language spoken in the Ender's Game series, which is nearly identical to American English.