• IPA: /jɜː(ɹ)k/

yerk (yerks, present participle yerking; past and past participle yerked)

1. (archaic) to stab.
   • c. 1603, William Shakespeare, Othello^wikisource

     I lack iniquity / Sometimes to do me service: nine or ten times / I had thought to have yerk’d him here, under the ribs.

2. To throw or thrust with a sudden, smart movement; to kick or strike suddenly; to jerk.

   • They flirt, they yerk, they backward […] fling.

   • 1599, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act IV, scene vii]:

     Their wounded steeds […] / Yerk out their armed heels at their dead masters.

3. (obsolete, Scotland) To strike or lash with a whip or stick.
4. (obsolete, Scotland) To rouse or excite.
5. To bind or tie with a jerk.

yerk (plural yerks)

1. (archaic) A sudden or quick thrust or motion; a jerk.