tusk

English

Walruses with tusks.

Wikipedia

Men with elephant tusks.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈtʌsk/, X-SAMPA: /"tVsk/
• Rhymes: -ʌsk

Etymology 1

From Middle English tusk (also tux, tusch), from Old English tūx, tūsc (“grinder, canine tooth, tusk”), from Proto-Germanic *tunþskaz (“tooth”), extended form of Proto-Germanic *tanþs (“tooth”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃dónts (“tooth”). Cognate with West Frisian tosk (“tooth”), Icelandic toskur (“a tusk, tooth”) (whence the Old Norse and Icelandic Ratatoskr and Ratatoskur respectively), Gothic  (tunþus, “tooth”) and  (tundi, “thorn, tooth”). More at tooth.

Noun

tusk (plural tusks)

1. One of a pair of elongated pointed teeth that extend outside the mouth of an animal such as walrus, elephant or wild boar.

   Until the CITES sales ban, elephant tusks were the 'backbone' of the legal ivory trade.

2. A small projection on a (tusk) tenon.
3. A tusk shell.
4. (carpentry) A projecting member like a tenon, and serving the same or a similar purpose, but composed of several steps, or offsets, called teeth.

Translations

pointed tooth

• Arabic: ناب (ar) (nab) m

  Egyptian Arabic: ناب (nab) m

• Armenian: ժանիք (hy) (žanik’) 
• Burmese: စွယ် (my) (swè)
• Catalan: ullal (ca) m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 長牙 (cmn), 长牙 (cmn) (chángyá)

• Czech: kel (cs) m
• Danish: stødtand (da) c
• Dutch: slagtand (nl) m, stoottand (nl) m
• Esperanto: dentego (eo)
• Finnish: syöksyhammas (fi)
• French: dent saillante f, défense f
• German: Stoßzahn (de)
• Greek: χαυλιόδοντας (el) (chavlidontas) m 

• Hungarian: agyar (hu)
• Italian: zanna (it) f
• Japanese: 牙 (ja) (きば, kiba)
• Korean: 엄니 (ko) (eomni), 송곳니 (ko) (songgotni)
• Lojban: jirnyde'i (jbo) pl
• Macedonian: бивна (mk) (bívna) f
• Malay: (elephant's) gading (ms)
• Polish: kieł (pl) m
• Russian: клык m (walrus', boar's); бивень (ru) m (bivenʹ) (elephant's)
• Serbo-Croatian: kljova (sh) f
• Spanish: colmillo (es) m
• Swahili: pembe-jino (sw) sg, pembe-meno (sw) pl
• Telugu: దంతము (te) (daMtamu)
• West Frisian: slachttosk

Verb

tusk (third-person singular simple present tusks, present participle tusking, simple past and past participle tusked)

1. To dig up using a tusk, as boars do.
2. (obsolete) To bare or gnash the teeth.

Related terms

• tusked
• tusker
• tusklike
• tusky
• tusk tenon

References

• “tusk” in Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary (2001).
• Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, G.&C. Merriam Co., 1967

Etymology 2

Noun

tusk (plural tusks)

1. A fish, the torsk.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.

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Old Frisian

Alternative forms

• tosk

Etymology

Cognate with Old English tūsc.

Noun

tusk m

1. tooth

Declension

Declension of tusk (strong a-stem, masculine)

	singular	plural
nominative	tusk	tuskar, tuska
accusative	tusk	tuskar, tuska
genitive	tuskes	tuska
dative	tuske	tuskum, tuskem

Descendants

• West Frisian: tosk