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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

auk.

Any of several species of Arctic sea birds of the family Alcidae.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ɔːk/Northern-England, Received-Pronunciation, Wales/oːk/Australia, British, New-Zealand, Southern, Standard/ɔk/General-American/ɑk/cot-caught-merger
  1. Any of several species of Arctic sea birds of the family Alcidae.

Where this word comes from

From Icelandic álka, from Old Norse alka (“auk”), from Proto-Germanic *alkǭ, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁el- (“a kind of bird”). Cognate with Swedish alka (“auk”), Norwegian and Danish alke (“auk”), Swedish dialectal alla (“long-tailed duck”) (Clangula hyemalis, syn. Fuligula glacialis), Latin olor (“swan”), Ancient Greek ἐλέα (eléa, “marsh-bird”), Welsh alarch (“swan”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.