different between pack vs heap

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pæk/, [p?æk]
• Rhymes: -æk

Etymology 1

From Middle English pak, pakke, from Old English pæcca and/or Middle Dutch pak, packe; both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *pakkô (“bundle, pack”). Cognate with Dutch pak (“pack”), Low German Pack (“pack”), German Pack (“pack”), Swedish packe (“pack”), Icelandic pakka, pakki (“package”).

Noun

pack (plural packs)

1. A bundle made up and prepared to be carried; especially, a bundle to be carried on the back, but also a load for an animal, a bale.

2. A number or quantity equal to the contents of a pack
3. A multitude.

4. A number or quantity of connected or similar things; a collective.
5. A full set of playing cards

6. The assortment of playing cards used in a particular game.

7. A group of hounds or dogs, hunting or kept together.
   • 2005, John D. Skinner and Christian T. Chimimba, The Mammals of the Southern African Subregion

     African wild dogs hunt by sight, although stragglers use their noses to follow the pack.

8. A wolfpack: a number of wolves, hunting together.
9. A group of people associated or leagued in a bad design or practice; a gang.
10. A group of Cub Scouts.
11. A shook of cask staves.
12. A bundle of sheet iron plates for rolling simultaneously.
13. A large area of floating pieces of ice driven together more or less closely.

14. (medicine) An envelope, or wrapping, of sheets used in hydropathic practice, called dry pack, wet pack, cold pack, etc., according to the method of treatment.
15. (slang): A loose, lewd, or worthless person.
16. (snooker, pool) A tight group of object balls in cue sports. Usually the reds in snooker.
17. (rugby) The forwards in a rugby team (eight in Rugby Union, six in Rugby League) who with the opposing pack constitute the scrum.

Synonyms

(full set of cards): deck

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English pakken, from the noun (see above). Compare Middle Dutch packen (“to pack”), Middle Low German packen (“to pack”).

Verb

pack (third-person singular simple present packs, present participle packing, simple past and past participle packed)

1. (physical) To put or bring things together in a limited or confined space, especially for storage or transport.
   1. (transitive) To make a pack of; to arrange closely and securely in a pack; hence, to place and arrange compactly as in a pack
      • 1712, Joseph Addison, The Spectator Number 275

        strange materials wound up in that shape and texture, and packed together with wonderful art in the several cavities of the skull
   2. (transitive) To fill in the manner of a pack, that is, compactly and securely, as for transportation; hence, to fill closely or to repletion; to stow away within; to cause to be full; to crowd into.
   3. (transitive) To wrap in a wet or dry sheet, within numerous coverings.

   4. (transitive) To make impervious, such as by filling or surrounding with suitable material, or to fit or adjust so as to move without allowing air, water, or steam inside.

   5. (intransitive) To make up packs, bales, or bundles; to stow articles securely for transportation.
   6. (intransitive) To form a compact mass, especially in order for transportation.

   7. (intransitive, of animals) To gather together in flocks, herds, schools or similar groups of animals.

   8. (transitive, historical) To combine (telegraph messages) in order to send them more cheaply as a single transmission.
2. (social) To cheat.
   1. (transitive, card games) To sort and arrange (the cards) in the pack to give oneself an unfair advantage
      • 1733 Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man

        Mighty dukes pack cards for half a crown.

   2. (transitive) To bring together or make up unfairly, in order to secure a certain result.
      • 1687, Francis Atterbury, An answer to some considerations on the spirit of Martin Luther and the original of the Reformation

        The expected council was dwindling into […] a packed assembly of Italian bishops.

   3. (transitive) To contrive unfairly or fraudulently; to plot.
      • 1655, Thomas Fuller, The church-history of Britain

        He lost life […] upon a nice point subtilely devised and packed by his enemies.

   4. (intransitive) To put together for morally wrong purposes; to join in cahoots.
3. (transitive) To load with a pack

4. (transitive, figuratively) to load; to encumber.
5. To move, send or carry.
   1. (transitive) To cause to go; to send away with baggage or belongings; especially, to send away peremptorily or suddenly; – sometimes with off. See pack off.
   2. (transitive, US, chiefly Western US) To transport in a pack, or in the manner of a pack (on the backs of men or animals).
   3. (intransitive) To depart in haste; – generally with off or away.
      • 1723, Jonathan Swift, Stella at Wood-Park:

        Poor Stella must pack off to town.

      • 1842, Alfred Tennyson, Dora:

        You shall pack, / And never more darken my doors again.

   4. (transitive, slang) To carry weapons, especially firearms, on one's person.

6. (transitive, sports, slang) To block a shot, especially in basketball.
7. (intransitive, rugby, of the forwards in a rugby team) To play together cohesively, specially with reference to their technique in the scrum.
8. (intransitive, LGBT, of a drag king, trans man, etc.) To wear a prosthetic penis inside one’s trousers for better verisimilitude.

Synonyms

• (To sort and arrange (the cards) in a pack so as to secure the game unfairly): stack

Antonyms

• (make into a pack): unpack

Derived terms

Translations

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pak/

Noun

pack m (plural packs)

1. pack (item of packaging)
2. pack ice
3. (sports) A rugby team

Middle English

Noun

pack

1. Alternative form of pak

Scots

Adjective

pack

1. intimate; confidential

Spanish

Etymology

From English pack.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?pak/, [?pak]

Noun

pack m (plural packs)

1. pack, package
2. kit, set, bundle
3. (colloquial, euphemistic) sexual photos and videos, paid or not, sent over internet, network social; sexting photos

Swedish

Noun

pack n

1. a group of unwanted people, lower class people, trash
2. stuff, things, luggage; only in the expression pick och pack

Declension

See also

• packa
• paket

Descendants

• ? Finnish: pakka

English

Etymology

From Middle English heep, from Old English h?ap, from Proto-West Germanic *haup, from Proto-Germanic *haupaz (compare Dutch hoop, German Low German Hupen, German Haufen), from Proto-Indo-European *koupos (“hill”) (compare Lithuanian ka?pas, Albanian qipi (“stack”), Avestan ????????????????? (kåfa)).

Pronunciation

• enPR: h?p, IPA^(key): /hi?p/
• ((Ireland), dated) enPR: h?p, IPA^(key): /he?p/
• Rhymes: -i?p

Noun

heap (plural heaps)

1. A crowd; a throng; a multitude or great number of people.
   • 1623, Francis Bacon, An Advertisement touching an Holy War

     a heap of vassals and slaves

   • 1876, Anthony Trollope, s:Doctor Thorne

     He had plenty of friends, heaps of friends in the parliamentary sense

2. A pile or mass; a collection of things laid in a body, or thrown together so as to form an elevation.

   • Huge heaps of slain around the body rise.
3. A great number or large quantity of things.
   • 1679, Gilbert Burnet, The History of the Reformation of the Church of England

     a vast heap, both of places of scripture and quotations

   • 1878, Robert Louis Stevenson, s:Will o' the Mill

     I have noticed a heap of things in my life.

4. (computing) A data structure consisting of trees in which each node is greater than all its children.
5. (computing) Memory that is dynamically allocated.

6. (colloquial) A dilapidated place or vehicle.
   • 1991 May 12, "Kidnapped!" Jeeves and Wooster, Series 2, Episode 5:

     Chuffy: It's on a knife edge at the moment, Bertie. If he can get planning permission, old Stoker's going to take this heap off my hands in return for vast amounts of oof.

7. (colloquial) A lot, a large amount

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:lot

Hyponyms

• compost heap

Derived terms

• heapful
• heapmeal
• it takes a heap of living to make a house a home

Descendants

• Sranan Tongo: ipi

Translations

Verb

heap (third-person singular simple present heaps, present participle heaping, simple past and past participle heaped)

1. (transitive) To pile in a heap.

2. (transitive) To form or round into a heap, as in measuring.
   • 1819, John Keats, Otho the Great, Act I, scene II, verses 40-42

     Cry a reward, to him who shall first bring
     News of that vanished Arabian,
     A full-heap’d helmet of the purest gold.

3. (transitive) To supply in great quantity.

Synonyms

• (pile in a heap): amass, heap up, pile up; see also Thesaurus:pile up

Derived terms

• heap coals of fire on someone's head
• heaped (adj), heaping (adj)
• heap up
• overheap

Translations

Adverb

heap (not comparable)

1. (offensive, representing broken English stereotypically or comically attributed to Native Americans) Very.
   • 1980, Joey Lee Dillard, Perspectives on American English (page 417)

     We are all familiar with the stereotyped broken English which writers of Western stories, comic strips, and similar literature put into the mouths of Indians: 'me heap big chief', 'you like um fire water', and so forth.

   • 2004, John Robert Colombo, The Penguin Book of Canadian Jokes (page 175)

     Once upon a time, a Scotsman, an Englishman, and an Irishman are captured by the Red Indians […] He approaches the Englishman, pinches the skin of his upper arm, and says, "Hmmm, heap good skin, nice and thick.

Anagrams

• HAPE, HEPA, epha, hep A

Old English

Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *haup, from Proto-Germanic *haupaz.

Cognate with Old Frisian h?p, Old Saxon h?p, Old High German houf. Old Norse hópr differs from the expected form *haupr because it is a borrowing from Middle Low German.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /xæ???p/, [hæ???p]

Noun

h?ap m

1. group
   • late 10th century, Ælfric, "The Nativity of St. Paul the Apostle"

2. heap

Declension

Derived terms

• h?apm?lum

Descendants

• Middle English: heep
  • English: heap

Portuguese

Etymology

From English heap

Noun

heap m or f (in variation) (plural heaps)

1. (computing) heap (tree-based data structure)

West Frisian

Etymology

From Old Frisian h?p, from Proto-West Germanic *haup, from Proto-Germanic *haupaz (“heap”).

Noun

heap c (plural heapen or heappen, diminutive heapke)

1. heap, pile
2. mass, gang, horde

Further reading

• “heap”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011