brick
Forms
- Plural
- bricks
- present (v1)
- brick
- past (v2)
- bricked
- past participle (v3)
- bricked
- present participle
- bricking
- 3rd person singular
- bricks
Definitions
1.A hardened rectangular block of mud, clay etc., used for building.
- This wall is made of bricks.
2.Such hardened mud, clay, etc. considered collectively, as a building material.
- This house is made of brick.
- They gather one by one, trickling into the shady courtyard, the familiar hum of Mass. Ave. wafting in from behind brick buildings and iron gates.
3.Something shaped like a brick.
4.The colour brick red.
- He disentangled himself from the safe door and delved inside. He brought out a brick of banknotes.
- A few times, when I got tired of my whisky highs and tobacco fumes, I turned to my new little helper, the tiny brick of cannabis resin I got from Don.
- The handyman considered the question and I knew she had a brick of ground beans in her bag but was considering whether the beds and a hot drink was worth a brick of coffee.
1.To make (an electronic device) non-functional and usually beyond repair, as a result of software or configuration issues.(slang)
- My VCR was bricked during the lightning storm.
- Just need to project against users from deleting NK.BIN and bricking the device.
2.To build, line, or form with bricks.
- He came in and we went out to the back area I'd bricked amateurishly years ago.
- The shaft was next bricked between the decks until the top scaffold was supported by the brickwork and [made] to share the weight with the prids.
3.To make into bricks.
- The plant, which is here described, for bricking fine ores and flue dust, was designed and the plans produced in the engineering department of the Selby smelter.
4.To hit someone or something with a brick.(slang)
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #3740
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Etymology
From Late Middle English brik, bryke, bricke, from Middle Low German and Middle Dutch bricke ("cracked or broken brick; tile-stone"; modern Dutch brik), ultimately related to Proto-West Germanic *brekan (“to break”), whence also Old French briche and French brique (“brick”). Compare also German Low German Brickje (“small board, tray”). Related to break.