wreck

Pronunciation

• IPA: /rek/^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Anglo-Norman wrec (“wreckage cast ashore”),^[2][3][4] from a Scandinavian source: compare Old Norse rek, wreck, flotsam, from older *wrek, related to reka, to drive, push (see wreak).^[2][3][4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

In law, goods cast ashore by the sea after a shipwreck: 1077 in the OED, 1228 in Barnhart, the mid-12th century in Etymonline;^[6][2][3] the right to what washed up on shore was at first a crown perquisite.^[3]

Semantic evolution

A shipwreck, the destruction of a ship at sea, is first recorded in 1463,^[2][3] and a wrecked ship about 1290 in the OED, before 1500 in Barnhart.^[6][2] The general sense, violent destruction of anything, is from the 1570s,^[3] and the remains of something ruined (the wreck of a name) from 1713, in Addison's Cato.^[2][3] A person broken in health or spirits is a wreck by 1795.^[3] Road and rail accidents are wrecks by 1912 in American English.^[3] The verb, to cast ashore, is from before 1400,^[2] to destroy or ruin from 1510,^[2] and to suffer shipwreck from the 1670s.^[3] Wreckage is from 1837, in Carlyle's French Revolution.^[2]

Timeline

• 1077 – goods cast ashore (law).^[6]
• 1463 – a shipwreck.^[2]
• 1510 – to destroy.^[2]
• 1713 – the remains of a ruin.^[2]
• 1837 – wreckage.^[2]
• 1912 – a road or rail accident (US).^[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. The destruction of a ship at sea; a shipwreck.
2. The remains of something badly damaged, as a ship, car or building.
3. A person in very poor health or spirits.
4. (chiefly US) A road or rail accident.
5. (law) Goods washed ashore from a wrecked ship.

Verb

1. To destroy or badly damage, as in a collision.
2. To ruin: to wreck someone's plans.

Word family

• shipwreck
• wreckfish
• wreckful
• wrecker
• wreckage

Related words

• wreak
• wrack

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 Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press