block

Pronunciation

• IPA: UK /blɒk/, US /blɑːk/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English blok, blokke,^[2][3] borrowed from Old French bloc (“log, block of wood”),^[2][4][5] from a Germanic source,^[2] Middle Dutch blok (“trunk of a tree”),^[4][3][6] of unknown ultimate origin.^[5][6] Related words are Old High German bloh, Middle Low German block and Middle Irish blog “fragment”.^[3][5] Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *bhelg- (“a thick plank, beam”), the root of balk,^[2] and Merriam-Webster perhaps to Old High German bliuwan “to beat”, akin to blow.^[3] It was an Anglo-French surname, Blocker, from 1212, and appears in the compound blockbord in 1323.^[4] The verb is partly from the noun and partly from French bloquer.^[5][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

A log of wood, part of a tree trunk, a stump: about 1305 in the OED,^[8] the early 14th century in Etymonline,^[2] and 1390 in Barnhart.^[4]

Semantic evolution

By the late 15th century the word was used of any solid piece.^[2] A block for chopping meat or wood is from about 1485, and the block on which the condemned were beheaded from 1541;^[8] the phrase put one's head on the block is from the mid-16th century.^[9] A stupid person was compared to a block from about 1410.^[8] A pulley in a wooden case is from about 1400, hence block and tackle (1825).^[2] A block of buildings bounded by four streets is North American from 1796;^[2][9] Bartlett (1848) called it “a very useful” American term.^[2][10] The auction block on which slaves were sold is from 1842.^[2] The verb, “to obstruct”, is from about 1425,^[8] the 1590s in Etymonline,^[2] and “to blockade” from 1591.^[8] A block in cricket is from 1772 and in American football from 1889.^[2] A mental block is a later development of the noun “obstruction” (1831).^[2] The political bloc is the same French word readopted in 1903.^[4][9]

Timeline

• c. 1305 – a log, a stump.^[8]
• c. 1400 – a pulley.^[2]
• c. 1425 – verb, to obstruct.^[8]
• c. 1485 – a chopping block.^[8]
• 1541 – the executioner's block.^[8]
• 1591 – verb, to blockade.^[8]
• 1796 – a city block.^[2]
• 1831 – an obstruction.^[2]
• 1842 – an auction block.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A solid piece of hard material, such as wood or stone, with one or more flat sides.
2. Such a piece used for chopping, or one on which people were beheaded.
3. A section of a town bounded by four streets, or the distance along one side of it.
4. A large building divided into flats or offices.
5. A pulley or set of pulleys in a casing.
6. An obstacle or obstruction; a stoppage of thought: a mental block.
7. A group of things treated as a unit: a block of seats.

Verb

1. To stop passage through; to obstruct.
2. To hinder or prevent the movement or progress of; in sports, to stop an opponent or a shot.
3. To shut out from view.
4. To shape or support with a block.

Word family

• blocker
• blockable
• blockbuster
• roadblock
• blockhead
• blockage
• blocking
• nonblocking

Related words

• bloc
• blockade
• balk
• blow

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Bartlett, John Russell (1848), Dictionary of Americanisms, New York: Bartlett and Welford