stock
see also: Stock
Pronunciation
  • (British) enPR: stŏk, IPA: /stɒk/
  • (America) enPR: stäk, IPA: /stɑk/
Etymology 1

From Middle English stok, from Old English stocc, from Proto-West Germanic *stokk, from Proto-Germanic *stukkaz, with modern senses mostly referring either to the trunk from which the tree grows (figuratively, its origin and/or support/foundation), or to a piece of wood, stick, or rod.

Noun

stock

  1. A store or supply.
    1. (operations) A store of goods ready for sale; inventory.
      We have a stock of televisions on hand.
    2. A supply of anything ready for use.
      Lay in a stock of wood for the winter season.
    3. Railroad rolling stock.
    4. (cards, in a card game) A stack of undealt cards made available to the players.
    5. Farm or ranch animals; livestock.
    6. The population of a given type of animal (especially fish) available to be captured from the wild for economic use.
  2. (finance) The capital raised by a company through the issue of shares. The total of shares held by an individual shareholder.
    1. The price or value of the stock of a company on the stock market.
      When the bad news came out, the company's stock dropped precipitously.
    2. (especially, US) A share in a company.
    3. (figurative) The measure of how highly a person or institution is valued.
      Synonyms: reputation
      After that last screw-up of mine, my stock is pretty low around here.
    4. Any of several types of security that are similar to a stock, or marketed like one.
  3. The raw material from which things are made; feedstock.
    1. (cooking, uncountable, countable) Broth made from meat (originally bones) or vegetables, used as a basis for stew or soup.
    2. The type of paper used in printing.
      The books were printed on a heavier stock this year.
    3. Ellipsis of film stock
    4. Plain soap before it is coloured and perfumed.
  4. Stock theater, summer stock theater.
  5. The trunk and woody main stems of a tree. The base from which something grows or branches.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC ↗, Job 14:8–9 ↗:
      Though the roote thereof waxe old in the earth, and the stocke thereof die in the ground: Yet through the sent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughes like a plant.
    1. (horticulture) The plant upon which the scion is grafted.
      • 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC ↗:
        The cion overruleth the stock quite.
    2. (by extension) Lineage, family, ancestry.
      • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC ↗; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act I, scene i ↗:
        UUhat, ſhall I call thee brother? No, a foe,
        Monſter of Nature, ſhame vnto thy ſtocke,
        That darſt preſume thy Soueraigne for to mocke.
      • 2010, Lewis Richard Farnell, The Cults of the Greek States, page 108:
        We may also conclude that as it was the Ionic γένη of the Attic tetrapolis who in the main achieved the Ionization of Athens, so it was a branch of this same stock that settled at Delos […]
      1. (linguistics) A larger grouping of language families: a superfamily or macrofamily.
  6. Any of the several species of cruciferous flowers in the genus Matthiola.
  7. A handle or stem to which the working part of an implement or weapon is attached.
    1. (firearm) The part of a rifle or shotgun that rests against the shooter's shoulder.
    2. The handle of a whip, fishing rod, etc.
  8. Part of a machine that supports items or holds them in place.
    1. The headstock of a lathe, drill, etc.
    2. The tailstock of a lathe.
  9. A bar, stick or rod.
    1. A ski pole.
    2. (nautical) A bar going through an anchor, perpendicular to the flukes.
      • 1904–1906, Joseph Conrad, chapter IV, in The Mirror of the Sea, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y., London: Harper & Brothers, published October 1906, →OCLC ↗:
        The honest, rough piece of iron, so simple in appearance, has more parts than the human body has limbs: the ring, the stock, the crown, the flukes, the palms, the shank. All this, according to the journalist, is “cast” when a ship arriving at an anchorage is brought up.
    3. (nautical) The axle attached to the rudder, which transfers the movement of the helm to the rudder.
    4. (geology) A pipe (vertical cylinder of ore)
  10. A type of (now formal or official) neckwear.
    1. A necktie or cravat, particularly a wide necktie popular in the eighteenth century, often seen today as a part of formal wear for horse riding competitions.
    2. A piece of black cloth worn under a clerical collar.
  11. A bed for infants; a crib, cot, or cradle
  12. (folklore) A piece of wood magically made to be just like a real baby and substituted for it by magical beings.
  13. (obsolete) A cover for the legs; a stocking.
  14. A block of wood; something fixed and solid; a pillar; a firm support; a post.
    • 1673, John Milton, “[Sonnet] XV. On the late Massacher in Piemont.”, in Poems, &c. upon Several Occasions, London: […] Tho[mas] Dring […], →OCLC ↗, page 58 ↗:
      When all our Fathers worſhip't Stocks and Stones,
    • 1655, Thomas Fuller, The History of Waltham Abbey:
      Item, for a stock of brass for the holy water, seven shillings; which, by the canon, must be of marble or metal, and in no case of brick.
  15. (by extension, obsolete) A person who is as dull and lifeless as a stock or post; one who has little sense.
    • c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act I, scene i]:
      Let's be no stoics, nor no stocks.
  16. (UK, historical) The longest part of a split tally stick formerly struck in the exchequer, which was delivered to the person who had lent the king money on account, as the evidence of indebtedness.
  17. (shipbuilding, in the plural) The frame or timbers on which a ship rests during construction.
  18. (UK, in the plural) Red and grey bricks, used for the exterior of walls and the front of buildings.
  19. (biology) In tectology, an aggregate or colony of individuals, such as trees, chains of salpae, etc.
  20. The beater of a fulling mill.
Synonyms Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Translations Verb

stock (stocks, present participle stocking; simple past and past participle stocked)

  1. To have on hand for sale.
    The store stocks all kinds of dried vegetables.
    • 2005, William Froug, How I Escaped from Gilligan's Island:
      ...he would not stock any product on his shelves from any company that hired a communist or, as it was called at the time, a comsymp.
  2. To provide with material requisites; to store; to fill; to supply.
    to stock a warehouse with goods
    to stock a farm, i.e. to supply it with cattle and tools
    to stock land, i.e. to occupy it with a permanent growth, especially of grass
  3. To allow (cows) to retain milk for twenty-four hours or more prior to sale.
  4. To put in the stocks as punishment.
    • c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):
      Poor Tom, that […] eats cow-dung for sallets; swallows the old rat, and the ditch-dog; drinks the green mantle of the standing pool; who is whipp'd from tything to tything, and stock'd, punish'd, and imprison'd
  5. (nautical) To fit (an anchor) with a stock, or to fasten the stock firmly in place.
  6. (card games, dated) To arrange cards in a certain manner for cheating purposes; to stack the deck.
Adjective

stock (not comparable)

  1. Of a type normally available for purchase/in stock.
    stock items
    stock sizes
  2. (racing, of a race car) Having the same configuration as cars sold to the non-racing public, or having been modified from such a car.
  3. Straightforward, ordinary, just another, very basic.
    He gave me a stock answer.
Translations Etymology 2

From Italian stoccata.

Noun

stock (plural stocks)

  1. A thrust with a rapier; a stoccado.

Stock
Etymology Proper noun
  1. A village/and/cpar in Chelmsford (OS grid ref TQ6998).
  2. Surname.
  3. Diminutive of Stockton



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