clock

A chronometer, an instrument that measures time, particularly the time of day.

Noun

  1. A chronometer, an instrument that measures time, particularly the time of day.
    • When the clock says midnight.
    • The seasons bring the flower again, ⁠And bring the firstling to the flock; ⁠And in the dusk of thee, the clock Beats out the little lives of men. - 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto II”, in In Memoriam, London:...
    • An interesting feature of the church is the invisible clock, which you can hear thumping away as you enter. Constructed in 1525, it is one of the oldest timepieces in England. It chimes the hours and the quarters, and...
  2. A common noun relating to an instrument that measures or keeps track of time.
    • A 12-hour clock system; an antique clock sale; Acme is a clock manufacturer.
  3. The odometer of a motor vehicle.
    • This car has over 300,000 miles on the clock.
  4. An electrical signal that synchronizes timing among digital circuits of semiconductor chips or modules.
  5. The seed head of a dandelion.
  6. A time clock.
    • I can't go off to lunch yet: I'm still on the clock.
    • We let the guys use the shop's tools and equipment for their own projects as long as they're off the clock.
  7. A CPU clock cycle, or T-state.
    • Executing a NEXT to code takes 7 clocks, or 1.05 microseconds. - 1984, The Journal of Forth Application and Research, volume 2, page 83:
    • The best schedule produced by any hardware algorithm takes 7 clocks, whereas the statically reordered code in Figure 1.2(b) takes only 5 clocks. - 1990, Joseph F. Traub, Barbara J. Grosz, Annual Review of Computer...
  8. A luck-based patience or solitaire card game with the cards laid out to represent the face of a clock.

    Synonyms: clock patience

  9. A watch (timepiece).
    • Arthur Morrison, Chance of the Game But if the clock was a red 'un, and the opportunity undoubted; to be pinched in the Bow Road merely might well imply loss of caste in the mob, but nobody need be ashamed to be pinched...
  10. A face; the head.

Origin

First use appears c. 1370. From Middle English clokke, clok, cloke (“clock”), from Middle Dutch clocke (“bell, clock”), from Old Dutch *klokka, from Medieval Latin clocca (“bell, clock, cloak”), probably of Celtic origin, from Proto-Celtic *klokkos (“bell”) (compare Welsh cloch (“bell”), Old Irish cloc (“bell, clock”)), either onomatopoeic or from Proto-Indo-European *klek- (“to laugh, cackle”) (compare Proto-Germanic *hlahjaną (“to laugh”)). Cognate with Old English clucge (“bell”), Saterland Frisian Klokke (“bell, clock”), Dutch klok (“clock, bell”), Low German Klock (“bell, clock”), German Glocke (“bell”), Danish and Norwegian klokke (“clock, bell”), Faroese klokka (“clock, bell”), Icelandic klukka (“clock, bell”), Swedish klocka (“clock, bell”), Asturian llueca (“cowbell”), Galician and Portuguese choca (“cowbell”), Doublet of cloak and cloche.

Forms

clocks CLK

Synonyms

chronometer odometer

Derived

12-hour clock 24-hour clock twenty-four-hour clock 400-day clock a broken clock is right twice a day Act of Parliament clock against the clock alarm clock alarum clock analog clock analogue clock anniversary clock around the clock around-the-clock a stopped clock is right twice a day astronomical clock atomic clock attoclock balloon clock banjo clock beat the clock beer clock bioclock biological clock

Noun Entry 2

  1. A pattern near the heel of a sock or stocking.
    • But this you can't stand, so you throw up your hand, and you find you're as cold as an icicle, In your shirt and your socks (the black silk with gold clocks), crossing Salisbury Plain on a bicycle - 1882, W.S. Gilbert,...
    • She'd a gown wi' girt flowers lik' hollyhocks An zome stockèns o' gramfer's a-knit wi' clocks - 1894, William Barnes, “Grammer's Shoes”, in Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect, page 110:
    • Most decoration involved the ankle clocks, and several are shown on p.15 in the form of charts. - 2004, Sheila McGregor, Traditional Scandinavian Knitting, Courier Dover, →ISBN, page 60:

Origin

Uncertain; designs may have originally been bell-shaped and thus related to Etymology 1, above.

Forms

clocks

Noun Entry 3

  1. A large beetle, especially the European dung beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius).

Forms

clocks

Verb Entry 4

  1. To measure the duration of.

    Synonyms: time

  2. To measure the speed of.
    • He was clocked at 155 miles per hour.
    • Dan Patch clocked a scorching 1:55.5 flat. - 1996, Jon Byrell, Lairs, Urgers and Coat-Tuggers, Sydney: Ironbark, page 186:
  3. To hit (someone) heavily.
    • When the boxer let down his guard, his opponent clocked him.

    Synonyms: slug smack thump whack

  4. To notice; to take notice of (someone or something).
    • Clock the wheels on that car!
    • It is true. Carmen is an official gold digger. In fact, she is an instructor at the school of gold digging. Hood rats have been clocking her style for years. Wanting to pull the players she pulled, and wishing they had...
    • Cut to the pub on a lads night out, / Man at the bar cos it was his shout, / Clocks this bird and she looks OK, / Caught him looking and she walks his way, - 2006, Lily Allen, “Knock 'Em Out”:

    Coordinate Terms: check out scope out

  5. To recognize; to assess, register.
    • I'd already clocked her as someone who couldn't reliably be believed when she spoke. And now this too!
    • Bo John and I twisted our heads around as Miranda braked over to the gravelly shoulder, let the Scout wheeze to a stop. She was climbing out, hurrying back to whatever had caught her eye. Bo John leered into the door...
  6. To identify (someone) as having some attribute (for example, being trans or gay).
    • Once my transition was complete I considered moving to London, where I felt there was less chance of being clocked and a larger support network.
    • Jaz said that the palpitations of fear he used to experience at the prospect of being publicly outed in the gurdwara dissipated after he clocked other gay Sikhs in there, even one who professed a Jat caste identity, he...
    • Consuella Lopez, the director of operations and housing at Casa Ruby, remembers. "The more passable your body was, the less bullying you'd get, the more chances of you getting a regular job at a regular place without...

    Synonyms: read

  7. To falsify the reading of the odometer of a vehicle.
    • I don't believe that car has done only 40,000 miles. It's been clocked.

    Synonyms: turn back (the vehicle's) clock wind back (the vehicle's) clock

  8. To beat a video game.
    • Have you clocked that game yet?
  9. To expose or attack someone, typically in a targeted and insulting manner.
    • Did you hear what she said about my outfit? She kind of clocked me.
    • You clocked, that guy is always running his mouth.
    • Its always a good day when I can clock someone using the (made up word) "unlessen". I just...ch... - 2013 April 30, @NICKIMINAJ, Twitter (post), archived from the original on 03 Dec 2025:

Forms

clocks clocking clocked CLK

Derived

clockable clocker clock in clock off clock on clock onto clock out clock the tea clock up clocky downclock overclock reclock self-clocking underclock upclock

Verb Scotland, dated

  1. To make the sound of a hen; to cluck.
  2. To hatch.

Origin

From Middle English clokken, from Old English cloccian, ultimately imitative; compare Dutch klokken, English cluck.

Forms

clocks clocking clocked

Derived

clocker

Verb Entry 6

  1. To ornament (e.g. the side of a stocking) with figured work.

Forms

clocks clocking clocked

Related

meter watch

Wikipedia

clock