different between mischief vs lark

English

Etymology

From Middle English myschef, meschef, meschief, mischef, from Old French meschief, from meschever (“to bring to grief”), from mes- (“badly”) + chever (“happen; come to a head”), from Vulgar Latin *capare, from Latin caput (“head”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?m?st??f/, /?m??t??f/
• Rhymes: -?st??f

Noun

mischief (countable and uncountable, plural mischiefs)

1. (uncountable) Conduct that playfully causes petty annoyance.

   Synonyms: delinquency, naughtiness, roguery, scampishness; see also Thesaurus:villainy, Thesaurus:mischief

2. (countable) A playfully annoying action.

3. (collective) A group or a pack of rats.
   • 2014, G. W. Rennie, The Rat Chronicles, iUniverse ?ISBN, page 21

     Kirac, the leader of the rats under his charge, speaks to the major through his telepathic abilities that manifested after the alien virus infected him and his mischief of rats.

   • 2015, Rachel Smith, John Davidson, Rats For Kids, Mendon Cottage Books ?ISBN, page 6

     A group of rats is not a herd or a gaggle, but a pack or a mischief of rats. Rats in general are omnivorous, meaning they will eat almost anything.

4. (archaic) Harm or injury:
   1. (uncountable) Harm or trouble caused by an agent or brought about by a particular cause.
      • 1815, Jane Austen, Emma, Volume I, Chapter 8:

        Vanity working on a weak head, produces every sort of mischief.
   2. (countable) An injury or an instance of harm or trouble caused by a person or other agent or cause.

5. (law) A criminal offence defined in various ways in various jurisdictions, sometimes including causing damage to another's property.
6. (archaic, countable) A cause or agent of annoyance, harm or injury, especially a person who causes mischief.

   Synonyms: bad boy, knave, rapscallion, rascal, rogue; see also Thesaurus:villain, Thesaurus:troublemaker
7. (euphemistic) The Devil; used as an expletive.
   • 1967, The Statesman (volume 12, page 260)

     What the mischief are you? and how the mischief did you get here, and where in thunder did you come from?

8. (Australia) Casual and/or flirtatious sexual acts.

Synonyms

• (harm or injury): agitation, annoyance, corruption, damage, demolition, destruction, detriment, disablement, disruption, evil, harm, hurt, ill, impairment, incapacitation, injury, nuisance, pique, ravage, sabotage, scathe, trouble, undoing, unmaking, vexation, weakening, wrong

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

• mischief at OneLook Dictionary Search
• Mischief in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)

Middle English

Noun

mischief

1. Alternative form of myschef

English

Alternative forms

• laverock, lavrock

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: läk, IPA^(key): /l??k/
• (General American) enPR: lärk, IPA^(key): /l??k/
• Rhymes: -??(?)k

Etymology 1

From Middle English larke, laverke, from Old English l?werce, l?werce, l?uricæ, from Proto-Germanic *laiwarik?, *laiwazik? (compare dialectal West Frisian larts, Dutch leeuwerik, German Lerche), from *laiwaz (borrowed into Finnish leivo, Estonian lõo), of unknown ultimate origin with no definitive cognates outside of Germanic.

Noun

lark (plural larks)

1. Any of various small, singing passerine birds of the family Alaudidae.
2. Any of various similar-appearing birds, but usually ground-living, such as the meadowlark and titlark.
3. (by extension) One who wakes early; one who is up with the larks.

   Synonyms: early bird, early riser

   Antonym: owl

Hyponyms

• (species in Alaudidae): woodlark, skylark, magpie-lark, horned lark, sea lark, crested lark, shorelark

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

lark (third-person singular simple present larks, present participle larking, simple past and past participle larked)

1. To catch larks (type of bird).

References

• lark on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Alaudidae on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
• Alaudidae on Wikispecies.Wikispecies

Etymology 2

Origin uncertain, either

• from a northern English dialectal term lake/laik (“to play”) (around 1300, from Old Norse leika (“to play (as opposed to work)”)), with an intrusive -r- as is common in southern British dialects; or
• a shortening of skylark (1809), sailors' slang, "play roughly in the rigging of a ship", because the common European larks were proverbial for high-flying; Dutch has a similar idea in speelvogel (“playbird, a person of markedly playful nature”).

Noun

lark (plural larks)

1. A romp, frolic, some fun.
2. A prank.

Synonyms

• whim, especially in phrase on a whim, see also Thesaurus:whim

Derived terms

• on a lark

Related terms

• skylark (in verb sense "play")

Translations

Verb

lark (third-person singular simple present larks, present participle larking, simple past and past participle larked)

1. To sport, engage in harmless pranking.
   • 1855, Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South, Chapter 35,^[3]

     […] the porter at the rail-road had seen a scuffle; or when he found it was likely to bring him in as a witness, then it might not have been a scuffle, only a little larking […]

2. To frolic, engage in carefree adventure.

Translations

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “lark”, in Online Etymology Dictionary
• Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, G.&C. Merriam Co., 1967

Anagrams

• Karl, Klar, Kral, klar