different between tuck vs flounce

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /t?k/
• Rhymes: -?k

Etymology 1

From Middle English tuken, touken (“to torment, to stretch (cloth)”), from Old English t?cian (“to torment, vex”) and Middle Dutch tucken (“to tuck”), both from Proto-Germanic *teuh-, *teug- (“to draw, pull”) (compare also *tukk?n?), from Proto-Indo-European *dewk- (“to pull”). Akin to Old High German zucchen (“to snatch, tug”), zuchôn (“to jerk”), Old English t?on (“to draw, pull, train”). Doublet of touch.

Verb

tuck (third-person singular simple present tucks, present participle tucking, simple past and past participle tucked)

1. (transitive) To pull or gather up (an item of fabric). [From 14^thc.]
2. (transitive) To push into a snug position; to place somewhere safe or somewhat hidden. [From 1580s.]
3. (intransitive, often with "in" or "into") To eat; to consume. [From 1780s.]
4. (ergative) To fit neatly.

5. To curl into a ball; to fold up and hold one's legs.

6. To sew folds; to make a tuck or tucks in.

7. To full, as cloth.
8. (LGBT, of a drag queen, trans woman, etc.) To conceal one’s penis and testicles, as with a gaff or by fastening them down with adhesive tape.

9. (when playing scales on piano keys) To keep the thumb in position while moving the rest of the hand over it to continue playing keys that are outside the thumb.
10. (aviation) Ellipsis of Mach tuck.

Antonyms

• untuck

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

tuck (plural tucks)

1. An act of tucking; a pleat or fold. [From late 14thC.]
2. (sewing) A fold in fabric that has been stitched in place from end to end, as to reduce the overall dimension of the fabric piece.
3. A curled position.
4. (medicine, surgery) A plastic surgery technique to remove excess skin.
5. (music, piano, when playing scales on piano keys) The act of keeping the thumb in position while moving the rest of the hand over it to continue playing keys that are outside the thumb.
6. (diving) A curled position, with the shins held towards the body.
7. (nautical) The afterpart of a ship, immediately under the stern or counter, where the ends of the bottom planks are collected and terminate by the tuck-rail.

Related terms

• tucker

Translations

Etymology 2

From Old French estoc (“rapier”), from Italian stocco (“a truncheon, a short sword”)

Noun

tuck (plural tucks)

1. (archaic) A rapier, a sword.
   • 1663, Hudibras, by Samuel Butler, part 1, canto 2

     [...] with force he labour'd / To free's blade from retentive scabbard; / And after many a painful pluck, / From rusty durance he bail'd tuck [...]

   • 1601, Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare, Act III, Scene I.

     [...] dismount thy tuck, be yare in thy preparation, for thy assailant is quick, skilful, and deadly. [...]

Translations

Etymology 3

Compare tocsin.

Noun

tuck (plural tucks)

1. The beat of a drum.

Etymology 4

Old Occitan tuc (“uncooked”).

Noun

tuck (uncountable)

1. (Britain, dated, school slang) Food, especially snack food.

Derived terms

• tuck shop
• tuck box
• tuck in

Manx

Verb

tuck (verbal noun tuckal, past participle tuckit)

1. to full (cloth)

Synonyms

• walk
• giallee

English

Etymology

Probably of North Germanic origin, from Norwegian flunsa (“hurry”), perhaps ultimately imitative. Or, perhaps formed on the pattern of pounce, bounce.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fla?ns/
• Rhymes: -a?ns

Verb

flounce (third-person singular simple present flounces, present participle flouncing, simple past and past participle flounced)

1. To move in an exaggerated, bouncy manner.
2. (archaic) To flounder; to make spastic motions.
   • a. 1677, Isaac Barrow, Of Contentment (sermon)

     To flutter and flounce will do nothing but batter and bruise us.

   • 1717, Joseph Addison, Metamorphoses

     With his broad fins and forky tail he laves / The rising surge, and flounces in the waves.

3. To decorate with a flounce.
4. To depart in a haughty, dramatic way that draws attention to oneself.

Translations

Noun

flounce (plural flounces)

1. (sewing) A strip of decorative material, usually pleated, attached along one edge; a ruffle.^W

   • Mind you, clothes were clothes in those days. […]  Frills, ruffles, flounces, lace, complicated seams and gores: not only did they sweep the ground and have to be held up in one hand elegantly as you walked along, but they had little capes or coats or feather boas.

2. The act of flouncing.

Derived terms

• flouncy

Translations

References

• Oxford English Dictionary, 1884–1928, and First Supplement, 1933.