balk

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English balke,^[2][3][4] inherited from Old English balca (“ridge, bank, beam”),^[2][5][6][4] perhaps from or influenced by Old Norse bálkr (“ridge of land; partition”).^[2][7] Ayto and the Shorter Oxford take the Norse word as the source of the sense "ridge";^[8][9] Hoad derives the ridge from late Old English balc and that Norse word, and only the beam from the Old English form in -a.^[10] All these forms go back to Proto-Germanic *balkô,^[1][2] which Kroonen glosses "beam",^[11] the sense of its cognates Old Saxon balko, Old Frisian balka, Old High German balko, German Balken, Dutch balk and bjalki.^[5][2][3] Etymonline traces the stem to Proto-Indo-European *bhelg- (“beam, plank”),^[2] also the source of Latin fulciō (“to prop up”) and fulcrum,^[2][3] of Lithuanian balžiena (“cross-bar”),^[2][3] and possibly of Ancient Greek φάλαγξ (phálanx, “trunk, log; line of battle”), phalanx.^[2][8] Germanic also gave Italian balco (“a beam”), the source of balcony.^[2][8] The verb is inherited from Middle English balken (“to make ridges in plowing”), from the noun.^[5][4][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

A ridge or mound on the ground: about 885, in Alfred's translation of Boethius,^[13][5] with on balcan lecgan, to lay in ridges.^[6] Its use for a ridge between furrows, or a strip left unploughed as a boundary, is recorded from about 1000.^[13] In Middle English, Barnhart's first record of the unplowed strip is from 1202, perhaps in a place name.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Most later senses grew out of the unploughed strip.^[2] A piece missed in ploughing by carelessness (about 1420)^[13] became a figure for any oversight or blunder, to make a balk (about 1430),^[13][5] and the ridge in the field became a hindrance or obstacle (about 1405).^[5][2] The verb followed: first "to make balks in ploughing" in Gower (1393),^[12][5] then to pass over or shirk something (about 1440),^[12][2] and in 1481 to stop short, especially of a horse refusing a jump.^[12][2] Its use for refusing something offered is from 1587,^[12][2] and Johnson (1755) puts "to disappoint; to frustrate" first, deriving the noun from Italian after Skinner.^[14] Klein instead took the verb to mean literally to put a beam in the way.^[3] The sense "beam", which the cognates have, is curiously late in English: before 1325, in the Cursor Mundi,^[5] or about 1300 in Ayto.^[8] Chaucer has it three times.^[15] In baseball a pitcher's false motion has been a balk since 1845,^[13][2] and Etymonline thinks this probably comes from the ploughing sense.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 885 – a ridge or mound on the ground.^[13][5]
• c. 1000 – a ridge between furrows; a strip left unploughed.^[13]
• before 1325 – a beam of timber.^[5]
• 1393 – verb, to make balks in ploughing.^[12][5]
• c. 1405 – a hindrance.^[5]
• c. 1430 – a slip or blunder.^[13][5]
• c. 1440 – verb, to pass over, overlook, shirk.^[12]
• 1481 – verb, to stop short as at an obstacle, especially of a horse.^[12]
• 1587 – verb, to refuse something offered.^[12] Etymonline dates this to the 1580s.^[2]
• before 1616 – verb, to let slip, fail to use.^[12]
• 1631 – verb, to avoid a duty.^[12]
• 1845 – noun, in baseball.^[13][2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To stop short and refuse to go on, especially of a horse at a jump: The mare balked at the gate.^[7][16][4]
2. To refuse abruptly or recoil from something, usually with at: The tenants balked at the rent increase.^[7][16][4]
3. To thwart or check someone or something, as if with an obstacle: Heavy snow balked the rescue attempt.^[16][4][14]
4. (baseball) Of a pitcher: to make an illegal motion before delivering the ball, which lets the runners advance a base.^[7][4]
5. (archaic) To pass over, overlook or shirk.^[4][12][17]

Noun

1. A rough squared beam of timber; a tie beam or rafter.^[4][16]
2. A strip of land left unploughed, between furrows or as a boundary.^[4][16][13]
3. A hindrance, check or disappointment.^[4][5]
4. (baseball) An illegal motion by the pitcher.^[4][13][2]
5. (billiards) The space behind the balkline on a table.^[4]
6. In jumping and vaulting events, a competitor's failure to follow through after approaching the line.^[4]
7. (obsolete) A slip, blunder or omission.^[4][13]

Word family

• balker
• balkingly
• balky
• balkline
• unbalked

Related words

• balcony
• fulcrum
• phalanx
• bulkhead
• debauch
• bilk

Usage notes

Baulk is the usual British spelling, and balk is chiefly North American.^[18][19] In Scottish and English dialects the word has many forms, bawk, boak, boke among them, and it especially means the ridges of ploughed land;^[20] in Lincolnshire to throw over the balk meant to publish the banns of marriage.^[20] The OED has a separate verb balk (1603), used of signalling the movement of herring or pilchard shoals to fishing boats from a height, probably from Dutch balken (“to bray, bawl, shout”).^[12] It also has a noun balk for cloth in the raw state (1841), from the verb in the local sense of "to leave unfinished".^[12][20]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
7. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b c d Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
9. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
13. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
15. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
16. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
17. ^ The Chambers Dictionary (2008), 11th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap
18. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
19. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
20. ^ a b c Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)