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pluck

[pluhk]

Example Sentences Origin

verb (used with object)

to pull off or out from the place of growth, as fruit, flowers, feathers, etc.: to pluck feathers from a chicken.

to give a pull at; grasp: to pluck someone's sleeve.

to pull with sudden force or with a jerk.

to pull or move by force (often followed by away, off, or out).

to remove the feathers, hair, etc., from by pulling: to pluck a chicken.

EXPAND

Slang. to rob, plunder, or fleece.

to sound (the strings of a musical instrument) by pulling at them with the fingers or a plectrum.

COLLAPSE

verb (used without object)

to pull or tug sharply (often followed by at).

to snatch (often followed by at).

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Pluck is always a great word to know.

So is lulu. Does it mean:

any remarkable or outstanding person or thing

unmitigated effrontery or impudence; gall, audacity, or nerve

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noun

10.

act of plucking; a tug.

11.

the heart, liver, and lungs, especially of an animal used for food.

12.

courage or resolution in the face of difficulties.

Verb phrase

13.

pluck up,

to eradicate; uproot.

to summon up one's courage; rouse one's spirits: He always plucked up at the approach of danger. She was a stranger in the town, but, plucking up her courage, she soon made friends.

Origin:
before 1000; Middle English plukken (v.), Old English pluccian, cognate with Middle Low German plucken; akin to Dutch plukken, German pflücken

Related forms

pluck·er, noun

half-plucked, adjective

un·plucked, adjective

well-plucked, adjective

Synonyms
2. tug. 3. yank, tear, rip. 12. bravery, boldness, determination, mettle, nerve.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To pluck

Example Sentences

Eagles and heron pluck fish from water coursing through the bright.

You're not allowed to pluck a number out of the air or to dole out hefty paychecks to people because they're your friends.

Yet fishing also made him think of trying to pluck words, with a rusty hook and no bait, out of the chaos of his mind.

EXPAND

Eagles and heron pluck fish from water coursing through the bright.

You're not allowed to pluck a number out of the air or to dole out hefty paychecks to people because they're your friends.

Yet fishing also made him think of trying to pluck words, with a rusty hook and no bait, out of the chaos of his mind.

Adept hunters, osprey dive from far above the surface to pluck fish from the water.

Mistaking them for berries, birds pluck the seeds from fruit and excrete them over a wide territory.

Each day exhibit staff and intern volunteers pluck the tags from the tree.

If there is a bug, it can often pluck the video or audio signal out of the.

The officials said another search was under way this evening after the initial rescue effort failed to pluck him from the waters.

But leave one or two nose hairs in case you need something to pluck to induce a stuck sneeze.

Later, some even charge into the foaming ocean to pluck a lucky banana from the waves.

Rich brown in color, oilbirds have powerful hooked beaks that they use to pluck fruit while hovering in the air.

When you set your receiver to so many cycles per second, you tune the antenna circuit to pluck that.

Another hypothesis is that primates needed to see well to pluck fruits from the ends of tree branches.

The keyboard sends signals to hammers that mechanically pluck the guitar strings when activated.

Most acquisitions of tech companies destroy the pluck and innovation of the startup.

Someone in the audience did pluck up the courage to ask what set them apart.

Snakes attack entire clutches, and wasps pluck out and carry off single squirming embryos.

The planes are designed to pluck all kinds of communications from the air.

To women who obsess over and excessively pluck their brows, tough talk is sometimes necessary.

Find out how he helped pioneer wildlife photography with a boxful of prints and a whole lot of pluck.

The genre is filled with throwbacks, outdated shapes that pluck your heartstrings but don't make much sense for modern life.

Simply pluck an ant from a branch, firmly but gently, and then position it so that your tongue.

On land, they pluck mice and insects from their hiding places and raid nests for tasty eggs.

The arms move up and down in tandem when you gently pluck them forward.

Army helicopters flew repeated missions to pluck stranded villagers from the flood waters.

They use this trunk to grab branches and clean them of leaves or to help pluck tasty fruit.

By the glow of headlamps the researchers pluck bats from the ceiling with practiced.

Then he heads home to pluck the teeny bullet out with his tweezers.

The multilayered character of much natural engineering makes it particularly difficult to penetrate and pluck apart.

As an adult, in moments of extreme stress, she has the compulsion to claw at her eyes as if to pluck them out.

These large birds feed by dipping their heads underwater to pluck aquatic plants, tubers, and roots.

They swab the cheeks of strangers and pluck hairs from corpses.

Harvesters pluck the package-caterpillar larva and parasitic fungus-whole from the ground.

It would pluck the best teams from the domestic leagues and elevate them to one pan-European super league.

Collins used the fingers of his right hand to strike and pluck the strings instead of a plectrum.

He will attend to the machinery by which the burglars will drop from the ceiling of the museum and pluck the dagger from its case.

Or, they slip into a cafe and pluck a croissant from a laden basket to dip into dark espresso.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

pluck (plʌk)

—vb (when intr, foll by at)
1.	(tr) to pull off (feathers, fruit, etc) from (a fowl, tree, etc)
2.	to pull or tug
3.	archaic (tr; foll by off, away, etc) to pull (something) forcibly or violently (from something or someone)
4.	(tr) to sound (the strings) of (a musical instrument) with the fingers, a plectrum, etc
5.	(tr) another word for strip
6.	slang (tr) to fleece or swindle

—n
7.	courage, usually in the face of difficulties or hardship
8.	a sudden pull or tug
9.	the heart, liver, and lungs, esp of an animal used for food

[Old English pluccian, plyccan; related to German pflücken]

'plucker

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

pluck

late O.E. ploccian "pull off, cull," from W.Gmc. *plokken (cf. M.L.G. plucken, M.Du. plocken, Flem. plokken), perhaps from V.L. *piluccare (cf. O.Fr. peluchier, c.1180), a frequentative, ultimately from L. pilare "pull out hair," from pilus "hair." But despite the similarities, OED finds difficulties

EXPAND

with this and cites gaps in historical evidence. Noun sense of "courage, boldness" (1785) is originally boxing slang, from meaning "heart, viscera" (1611) as that which is "plucked" from slaughtered livestock. Perhaps infl. by fig. use in pluck up (one's courage, etc.), attested from c.1300. Hence, plucky (1842).

"To pluck a rose, an expression said to be used by women for going to the necessary house, which in the country usually stands in the garden." [F. Grose, "Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue," 1785]

This euphemistic use is attested from 1613.

COLLAPSE

Slang Dictionary

pluck definition

and plug

n.
wine; cheap wine. (Originally black.) : He buys pluck by the box, yes the box! , You spilled your plug all over my car seat!

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Matching Quote

"To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace."

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